By Dianne Cornish, REVIEW STAFF

Last week MPP Ted McMeekin (Ancaster-Dundas-Flalmborough-Westdale) declined to sign a pledge to work with Ontario’s developmental service workers (DSWs) in advocating for improved provincial funding for their service sector. But it wasn’t because he won’t advocate for them when given the opportunity, he stresses.

The local MPP explained that although he has a lot of causes he wants to support at Queen’s Park, his role as a cabinet minister puts him in a tighter position than the average MPP. As Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, McMeekin has to make sure he doesn’t put himself in a conflict of interest position that will hamper him from supporting certain things, such as increased funding for government services. The Ontario cabinet puts the final stamp on funding commitments, so signing a pledge to assign more funding for a specific sector would place him in a conflict where he couldn’t speak to the issue or vote on it.

“I can’t be both an advocate and a decision-maker at the same time,” McMeekin said, noting that the province’s integrity commissioner has stated as much about cabinet ministers.

His explanation for refusing to sign the funding pledge caught CUPE Local 3943 president Jim Beattie of Hamilton by surprise when he met with McMeekin at his constituency office in Waterdown last Friday, but the union rep came away from the meeting satisfied that the MPP’s “heart is there” and that “he wants to see support for the developmentally disabled.” Beattie said he couldn’t fault McMeekin for not signing the pledge. “I can understand his position.”

But with nearly 23,000 children and adults with developmental disabilities across Ontario on waiting lists for services and supports, he also said DSWs will continue to lobby and meet with MPPs “to make sure this issue (funding need) is in the forefront.”

Noting that the provincial Liberals provided an infusion of $220 million to the developmental services sector in 2007, Beattie said workers are hoping to keep that momentum alive by pushing for more funding.

A DSW for the past 24 years with Community Living in Hamilton, Beattie said about 80 to 90 percent of the agency’s funding comes from the Ontario government. DSWs provide professional care to people with developmental disabilities, providing them with life skills and other training, support with basic personal tasks and administering medications.

Commenting on the Special Services at Home (SSAH) and the Passport programs, administered through the Ministry of Community and Social Services to provide funding and services for the developmentally disabled, Beattie said, “If the agency system was properly funded, there wouldn’t be any need for SSAH or the Passport programs.” The former helps families pay for special services for developmentally disabled children or adults in or outside the family home while the latter eases the transition of the developmentally disabled from school to life in the community.

He was also critical of the government’s recent establishment of nine Developmental Services Ontario (DSO) offices throughout the province, including one in Hamilton, last July to provide what the government describes as “a single window to adult developmental services.” Parents of the disabled are now required to access services through the DSOs rather than through various agencies. The centralization “requires more for parents to be able to access (services),” he said. “Some parents need more help.”

McMeekin said he talked about the need for more funding for the service sector, including support workers in long-term care facilities and those working with the developmentally disabled, when he addressed the annual meeting of the Service Employees International Union (SIEU) a year ago. “I said they were underpaid and overworked,” he recalled.

He also told the Review there is a need to look at better training and certification for PSWs (Personal Support Workers) employed in long-term care centres that care for the elderly and disabled.