Thread by @MatthewGreenNDP

My Open Letter to PM @JustinTrudeau and his Liberal Cabinet as they visit Hamilton Centre to deliberate their 2023 priorities and federal government agenda.

(1/22 🧵)
#cdnpoli #hamilton #canada #DisabilityTwitter #housing #healthcare

Dear Prime Minister and Members of Cabinet, 

It's a pleasure to welcome you to Hamilton. 

I genuinely hope you enjoy your time and have an opportunity to get outside your meeting rooms and interact with everyday working-class people here in Hamilton. 2/22

As I’m sure you will soon realize, Hamilton is an incredibly resilient city with a proud history of taking care of one another despite the many challenges we’ve faced over the past few decades. (3/22)

In many ways, Hamilton acts as the canary in the coal mine for Canada’s economic and social pressures; often, we are the first to feel the effects of bad government policy and are left to pick up the pieces as their impacts unfold across our neighbourhoods. (4/22)

While you deliberate the government objectives for the next year in advance of the 2023 budget, I hope you keep the needs of Hamiltonians and Canadians at the heart of your discussions. (5/22)

Without significant action from the federal government, people will continue to struggle and risk falling further behind. 

(6/22)

Let's work together to lift Canadians living with disability out of poverty and into the dignity they deserve.

It’s been more than 850 days since your government committed to providing the Canada Disability Benefits, (7/22)

yet people living with disabilities are still waiting, left legislated into deep poverty without adequate income support.

In contrast, it took just three days for your cabinet to approve $750 Billion dollars in liquidity supports for big banks and Bay St. (8/22)

People living with disabilities can’t afford any further delays or years of consultation.

We need the government to take meaningful action immediately to ensure people living with disabilities can lead healthy and dignified lives. (9/22)

Arriving in downtown Hamilton you would have likely observed the cranes constructing high-rise condos dotted across our skyline, yet in their shadows, we’ve left people living in the rough in tents and makeshift shelters during the frigid Canadian winter. (10/22)

I must remind you that in 2019, Parliament passed the National Housing Strategy Act, which “recognizes that the right to adequate housing is a fundamental human right affirmed in international law.” (11/22)

Housing is indeed a human right, and therefore it requires massive and immediate federal action on the same scale as the national housing crisis Canadians are currently facing. (12/22)

The Canadian Housing and Mortgage Corporation was founded on the post-war Victory Homes project that constructed 1 million much-needed social and rental housing for low-income families, most fully subsidized by the federal government. (13/22)

Now is the time to revisit these types of bold nation-building policies and finally begin to reclaim our housing market from massive corporations and the Real Estate Income Trusts (REITs) that have captured our housing and rental stock. (14/22)

Lastly, while the list of challenges we face in Hamilton Centre and across Canada is long, perhaps none is more acute coming out of COVID than our national crisis of public health care. (15/22)

While Hamilton is home to 10 hospitals and plays a critical role as a regional healthcare provider, it’s clear that healthcare is collapsing across the country. (16/22)

Canadians expect and deserve a federal government that will defend our public institutions.
(17/22)

We need a public healthcare system that follows the principles in the Canada Health Act, including equal access to care for all, a prohibition on charging patients for insured care, a ban on extra billing and preferential access. (18/22)

These are all within your powers as a cabinet and government that as New Democrats we call on you to enact now before it's too late. 
(19/22)

As the proud NDP MP representing Hamilton Centre, my hope for 2023 is for all MP’s, regardless of partisan affiliation, to work across party lines to improve the material conditions for people in Hamilton and across the country. (20/22)

The upcoming year will require bold leadership and a vision for Canada that fully addresses the daily challenges faced by too many people. (21/22)

Let us use the strength of the federal government to ensure the basic needs of everyone in Canada are met, to see that people are put ahead of profits, and to build a more caring and compassionate country that leaves no one behind. (22/22)

cc @FilomenaTassi @karinagould @ChadCollinsMP @lisahepfner