Unnecessary roadblocks have held up planning for a new Groves Memorial Community Hospital, according to Wellington-Halton Hills MPP Ted Arnott.
“On many occasions during the past six years, I have urged the [Dalton] McGuinty Liberal government to recognize our future need for a new Groves, to give us the go-ahead and support to proceed with detailed planning for the new hospital our community deserves, to stop creating new processes and bureaucratic roadblocks which only create disappointment and cynicism,” said Arnott in an Oct. 20 statement in the Ontario legislature.
He once again demanded Groves be given approval to proceed with detailed planning and a firm date for construction.
The hospital is now waiting for the Waterloo-Wellington Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) to review and approve its business case – and the planning grant that goes with it.
“The hospital has established and demonstrated our need,” said Arnott in the legislature. “Our community is behind it. Our hospital foundation has raised its share.
The [Local Health Integration Network] has all the requisite information.”
Arnott said, “Time and time again I have pushed this government to do the right thing. I say to the new Minister of Health: Come to Centre Wellington and see for yourself the special place that is Groves, then stand with us as we build the hospital we need in this 21st century.”
Decisions over which communities receive new hospitals must always be based on need – not on party politics, Arnott later explained.
“Partisan politics should never influence decisions on where new hospitals are built,” he said.
“No party holds power in perpetuity, but only for a time, by the consent of the people. And the people know there will be another provincial election in two years’ time.”
Arnott invited the new Minister of Health Deb Matthews, to attend the hospital’s CT Suite grand opening on Nov. 6 but she was unable to attend.
