Yiu calls for Bond to resign

By Dan Hilborn
Published April 20, 2005


Burnaby-Willingdon NDP candidate Gabriel Yiu is calling for the resignation of Health Services Minister Shirley Bond after uncovering what he believes is a plan to close the long-term care facility at Mount St. Joseph Hospital in Vancouver.

Yiu and MLA Jenny Kwan are pointing to an April 23, 2002 Vancouver Coastal Health Authority document that states the authority's residential care redevelopment plan includes the "eventual elimination of the residential capacity at MSJ."

Yiu said the 100-bed facility does an extraordinary job of providing special care and services to the Lower Mainland's Chinese community and it would be sorely missed if it were closed.

"There is a plan to close that facility," Yiu said Monday morning. "And the reason I am demanding Shirley Bond's resignation is that her immediate response was that the government has no plan at all. So that means to me that she is either misleading or lying to the public, and this is a serious matter."

Bond denied the allegation in an interview on Fairchild TV News on April 6, a transcript of which was provided to the Burnaby NOW by Yiu.

"It is absolutely unacceptable that they are frightening seniors in this way," Bond reportedly said. "This isn't about good policy or planning. This is about politics from their perspective. Government has no plans to close the facility. We value the role that it plays, particularly to the Chinese community. And, in fact, we've added (inaudible) hospital beds to the facility over the last year."

A similar rebuttal was provided by Yiu's election opponent, Liberal MLA John Nuraney.

"The minister has categorically refused there is any truth to the rumour that there is going to be any action taken at that hospital," Nuraney said. "They're talking about closure. The minister said categorically that it's not going to happen."

However, Nuraney also acknowledged that Providence Health Care, the operators of the privately owned hospital, are currently reviewing a plan that could see the start of a 'campus of care model,' which may not necessarily be located at Mount St. Joseph.

"The province is looking at this model. ... Where it will be located, I'm not sure, but no facility will be closed without an alternative facility being offered," Nuraney said.

When asked if the care centre at Mount St. Joseph could move, Nuraney replied: "At this point, it will stay there. The whole health-care system, as you know, now is on the way to improvement, and improvement means changes for the better," he said.

But Yiu said those statements are remarkably similar to comments made by the Liberals prior to the closure of Saint Mary's Hospital in New Westminster.

"This is more or less the same thing. First they deny it, and when they reach a decision to close it, they say those services will be maintained, but only in different facilities," Yiu said.

And if the long-term care facility does close its doors, Yiu said it will be an especially tough blow for seniors of Chinese heritage, who once benefited from a long list of Chinese-language services at Mount St. Joseph Hospital.

The centre once boasted a Chinese-language diabetic education clinic and a special housekeeper training program to help Asian women enter the workforce, and the cafeteria served Asian-style meals as a simple matter of routine, said Yiu.

In fact, Chinese acting legend Jackie Chan was so impressed by the care centre that he attended its official grand opening back in the days of the Social Credit government and continued to donate $5,000 to the centre every year.

"Mount St. Joseph had a long history of serving Chinese immigrants," Yiu said. "Now the government is trying to make it like any kind of ordinary hospital. They're taking away this expertise."

Yiu and Kwan are supporting a petition that calls for an immediate halt to the closure.