Today, the Manitoba Government released its third Throne Speech since being elected in 2016. Legislative changes in areas like assisted dying and child welfare as well as changes to early learning, provincial housing, and rural health care figure prominently in today’s speech. The Speech also included the unveiling of a “public service transformation strategy” that is geared to “challenge civil servants to better understand and meet the needs of citizens”.
“Today’s Throne Speech sounds a lot like more of the same from this government: they plan to continue with cuts and privatization while at the same time telling Manitobans it’s good for them,” said MGEU President Michelle Gawronsky. “While it’s true that Throne Speeches are often short on details, I can say for sure Manitobans are telling me that they’re worried about the government’s agenda and feel overwhelmed at the pace we are seeing these changes.”
The Manitoba Government has already announced a plan to cut 1,200 jobs from the public service (700 jobs have already been cut). The Speech also contained language about further reliance on public-private partnerships to provide infrastructure, and the use of social impact bonds to provide child welfare services.
“So we will see more downsizing of the services we have worked hard to build over many generations at a time when we are already feeling the squeeze of shortages in almost all government departments,” said Gawronsky. “If we don’t stand up for the public services we rely on they’ll be gone and we won’t get them back.”
Among the announcements today are changes to the Child and Family Services Act to grant foster parents a payment to become legal guardians, laws to allow health workers not to participate in assisted dying, and a further consolidation of health services through Shared Services Manitoba.
“Plans that are moving forward with Shared Services have made health care workers and communities nervous,” said Gawronsky. “We already know that four emergency rooms in rural Manitoba may be closed or replaced with urgent care centres and that lab workers are hearing of possible lab closures. It is our hope that people are given an opportunity to provide feedback before changes occur and to be given a real opportunity to bring forward their ideas on how to implement improvements that don’t involve job losses or dangerous cuts that put services at risk.”
The Premier said the government will review current provincial and municipal service responsibilities "where there may be overlap and duplication, in order to streamline service delivery" in such areas as road maintenance, snow removal, water control and drainage. It is unclear whether this means the offloading of services to municipalities or how provincial government workers who provide these services will be impacted.
Other announcement’s from today’s Throne Speech include:
- the “modernization” of procuring goods and services;
- legislation governing Manitoba’s child welfare system;
- increased use of self and family managed home care;
- changes to whistle blower protection; and
- development of a reconciliation strategy for Indigenous Manitobans.
The government also re-announced its commitment to provide better ambulance coverage by hiring paramedics in Manitoba. Although no immediate new hiring was mentioned in today’s Speech, the government’s promise is that no community will lose their EMS station unless sufficient full-time paramedics are hired.
“This government promised to be one of the most transparent governments in the country and today
they had a chance to clearly tell Manitobans what they have planned for our
public services,” said Gawronsky. “Instead, they failed to live up their
commitment and Manitobans are once again left to wonder what will happen next.”