Green Party of Ontario candidate Lori Borthwick took time out from campaigning for the September 19 Bay of Quinte by-election to appear on the Lorne Brooker Show on CJBQ Tuesday morning.
Borthwick says voting for her and the Green Party means getting an advocate for you.
“No other party that is of the main four will be able to represent your needs without first consulting with the leader of their party or maybe even just telling you what their party is going to do for you but I wanna hear from you, I want to know what your concerns are.”
After spending 30 years a respiratory therapist at Quinte Health, Borthwick is no stranger to the healthcare crisis, and says getting people access to primary care essential.
To do that, they have to be jobs medical students want to take on.
“The best way to do that is to fund them in a more supportive manner. We need to take a lot of the paperwork, onerous paperwork off of the family care team, especially the family physicians. They don’t want to be small business owners, they want to be doctors.”
Borthwick says a lot of specialists spend a lot of time fielding questions about primary care issues with patients because they don’t have anyone else to talk to.
When asked about homelessness and addiction issues, Borthwick says more funding is needed to support municipalities.
“As Greens, we strongly believe that we need to fund the municipalities at a much higher level and actually upload costs to the province but allow the municipalities to make the decisions on the ground that they need to make to support their unhoused folks.”
She says more support is also needed for mental health workers as many have left their jobs due to stress.
She adds the current provincial government could better spend its resources on healthcare, homeless and addiction rather than highways and where alcohol should be sold.
Borthwick says corporations and the wealthiest should also be paying their fair share of tax dollars rather putting the majority of the burden on the middle class.
The environment is still a major part of the Green Party’s platform.
With more extreme weather events becoming the norm, Borthwick says more resilient infrastructure is needed to handle them.
She adds our heating methods should also evolve.
“What we would prefer is that people would be using heat pumps. Heat pumps have come down a lot in price. They are very economical to run. And if you’re creating a new subdivision what could be better than a geothermal system which is two or three hundred per cent efficiency in heating and cooling peoples’ homes.”
The Lorne Brooker Show is hosting “Meet the Candidates” hours, ahead of the by-election for the Bay of Quinte riding.
Listen the full interview with Lori Borthwick:
