Whatever Chrystia Freeland is smoking, I need some. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To steal a line from an old movie, I\u2019ll have what she\u2019s having.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like a kid on a Bouncy Castle, our effervescent finance minister delivered her third federal budget and proclaimed that she is \u201creally, really optimistic\u201d about our future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Good for her but it\u2019s really, really confusing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a mere taxpayer without Chrystia\u2019s credentials or hands on the nation\u2019s purse strings, my mundane life involves cuts, cracks, and creaks that make me believe she and I live in very different places.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While she\u2019s hobnobbing with the world\u2019s grandees, my daily experiences bring me in touch with people like parents and grandparents worried sick about their kids\u2019 futures, family businesses facing bankruptcy because they can\u2019t find employees, and healthcare workers who have lost hope they will ever see our ragged health care system repaired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It has become traditional during the U.S. President\u2019s annual State of the Union address to pack the public gallery with true heroes and examples of the type of Americans who benefit from the current administration\u2019s policies and programs. These special guests are introduced by the president and applauded by a grateful Congress. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As is often the case, this practice has caught on here and during the visit of President Biden to the House of Commons recently the \u201ctwo Michaels,\u201d who were held captive in China for more than 1,000 days, were present in the public gallery, introduced and enthusiastically and duly honoured by the audience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Using that technique, therefore, let me introduce you to the kind of people I rub shoulders with and who lack Minister Freeland\u2019s bubbly optimism about the state of affairs in our neck of the woods. I have given them different names to respect their privacy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jennifer\u2019s cancer progressed to stage 4 as she struggled without a family doctor to requisition tests and obtain a timely diagnosis. She lost more valuable time when her records were lost in the shuffle of an overworked bureaucracy. She\u2019s a fighter but the fight needn\u2019t have been this hard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several friends and family are among the 8,000 to 10,000 local people who will soon be added to the millions of Canadians who don\u2019t have direct access to a family doctor. It\u2018s no exaggeration to say this will cause great suffering and probable death. As widely reported, six doctors in one practice here are all retiring and no one wants their jobs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Healthcare funding will be increased, and more workers will be trained and retrained but it will take years, wisdom, and political will to dig us out of this current quagmire of shortages, turf wars, inefficiencies, backlogs, and suffering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Where was the wisdom that should have foreseen and avoided this mess as our population aged, needs became increasingly complex, and immigration rose? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
My friend Christine worries about her own health working long shifts at the local hospital but answers the call for help on her days off because she is so committed to her patients and can\u2019t bear to see them and her co-workers suffer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mac, a retired public servant, is on the outs with his teenage grandson who is angry because his dad won\u2019t keep giving him money. Mac suggested the kid get a part-time job. \u201cA job? he scoffed like I was suggesting he rob a bank or give up his cell phone,\u201d Mac told me. Apparently, it\u2019s no longer cool for kids to work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eric is a distinguished, retired professional who used a recent family gathering to test his grandkids on their knowledge of Canadian history. \u201cWho knows who Sir John A. Macdonald is?\u201d Eric asked of the five offspring around the dinner table. Only one replied. \u201cHe\u2019s the old guy that killed all the Indian kids.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Toronto friends who for generations have ridden the buses, streetcars, and subways, are now scared for themselves and their children after a series of violent incidents on the TTC. Everywhere, crime is not only rising, but it\u2019s also becoming more violent and brazen, especially among young people. Mental health issues, a staggering opioid death rate, and the use of guns threaten communities across the spectrum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several of the high-profile murders now before the courts involve accused young men with a long record of major crimes who were out on bail at the time the murders were committed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Truth to tell, our justice system is as badly in need of reform as our health care. The only difference is that so many of us personally experience healthcare tragedies while our interest in courts and justice is relegated to what we learn from the media. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, our military struggles to attract recruits and our RCMP has lost its once-great reputation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even small pleasures are challenging these days. My day begins with a pot of coffee and three newspapers. Delivery of one of these was suddenly cancelled this week\u2014apparently for lack of a delivery person and\/or dropping circulation in my area. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
My friends Veronica and James live comfortably on pensions and used to treat themselves to a meal out once a week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo many restaurants can afford to open only a few days a week and can\u2019t get the staff they need. Staff they do have are overworked and often untrained and inexperienced. Think cold, soggy fries when they finally arrive\u2026 we\u2019re just staying home,\u201d they told me. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Staff shortages mean some rest stops on Highway 401 have resorted to using machines where customers order and pay while a skeletal kitchen staff struggles to fill orders for a waiting lineup of frustrated customers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Doesn\u2019t anyone want to work anymore? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Is it, as some have suggested, a case where more people are taking resources out of our economy through government payouts while fewer people are working and paying the taxes needed to fund our social services and infrastructure?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can shoot a cannon down the main streets of once safe and vital small towns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many shops, including those operated by the same families for generations, closed during the pandemic and never re-opened. It looks like there\u2019s only a real market for dollar stores, nail salons, and food banks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So many communities like our own struggle with a shortage of affordable housing, homelessness, unsafe and unlawful encampments, and people who live and beg on the streets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is in addition to other threats and challenges Canadians face. There is a fiscal storm brewing with inflation, high-interest rates, and increasing energy and grocery prices not to mention distant wars and foreign interference in our governments and other facets of our lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I haven\u2019t even mentioned our staggering debt levels that most people would rather just forget and leave to their grandkids to pay off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tony, our accountant, called this morning with a question to complete my income tax return: \u201cAre you willing to give permission for use of your organs after your death?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFirst, they came for my money. Now they\u2019re after my body parts,\u201d I quip and it\u2019s obvious I\u2019m not his first client to use that line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tony says that, unlike myself, more than 90 per cent of his clients decline to participate in this new tool to promote the important cause of organ donorship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAnother example of people who have become cynical and angry\u2014not good,\u201c I mumble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s obvious that Minister Freeland has a real selling job on her hands and it will be a frosty Friday before respect and confidence in our democratic institutions are restored and we can all clutch our pearls and be \u201creally, really optimistic.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Right now we\u2019re just all holding onto our hats\u2014and apparently our body parts too. <\/p>\n\n\n
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Sally Barnes has enjoyed a distinguished career as a writer, journalist and author. Her work has been recognized in a number of ways, including receiving a Southam Fellowship in Journalism at Massey College at the University of Toronto. A self-confessed political junkie, she has worked in the back-rooms for several Ontario premiers. In addition to a number of other community contributions, Sally Barnes served a term as president of the Ontario Council on the Status of Women. She is a former business colleague of Doppler\u2019s publisher, Hugh Mackenzie, and lives in Kingston, Ontario. You can find her online at sallybarnesauthor.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\nDon\u2019t miss out on Doppler!<\/h5>\n