MR. SPEAKER: Further petitions?

The hon. the Leader of the Opposition.

MS JONES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I stand today to present a petition on behalf of the people in the District of The Isles of Notre Dame, in the area of Twillingate, New World Island.

Mr. Speaker, this has to do with their health care facilities in that particular area and I will read the pray of the petition into the record.

WHEREAS there were fifteen acute care beds in the Notre Dame Bay Memorial Hospital Health Centre; and

Mr. Speaker, just a little bit of history behind this because I know the member for the area, the member for Twillingate and New World Island, is not going to stand up in the House of Assembly and address this issue on behalf of his constituents. It is only right and proper to tell what exactly happened here.

This was a case, Mr. Speaker, where there were beds in this particular hospital that normally, like acute care beds do in the summertime, they close down a certain number of beds in hospitals all across the Province. That is only because the intake is slower in the summer. A lot of our physicians, specialists are on vacation, so they are not scheduling as many procedures as you would normally do. It is not unusual for acute care beds to close in hospitals in the summer. What is unusual is when they do not reopen in the fall. That is what happened to the health centre in Twillingate-New World Island area.

In the fall, those acute care beds did not reopen. Instead, Mr. Speaker, the government reallocated them to restorative beds, which, you need to recognize, there was a need for restorative beds in that area as well. The people who were lobbying for these particular beds, Mr. Speaker, people who were lobbying for this type of care were doing so, but not to the point that they wanted to see acute care beds closed. They wanted to see extra beds added to their facility. That was the whole purpose, Mr. Speaker. They wanted to be able to ensure that people who needed the various types of care would receive those particular types of care. They did not want government to do this in an underhanded way, and that is exactly what happened here. That is exactly what happened.

What they did was instead of reopening the acute care beds in that particular area, they re-designated these particular beds to be used for restorative care beds, Mr. Speaker, and they went out and had a big public announcement. The MHA went in, the minister went in, Mr. Speaker, they had a big public announcement telling the people they were going to add restorative beds to the health care centre in the Twillingate-New World Island area. In fact, what they did is they closed five acute care beds, renamed them to be restorative care beds, and this was the health care plan that they offered the people of that area.

How gullible do you think people are? I say to the member: If you thought you were going to pull the wool over the people’s eyes in that district, you certainly failed to do so, because thousands of them have signed petitions and sent them to the House of Assembly to ensure that they get their acute care beds back.