Ontario NDP to reveal jobs plan for foreign-trained doctors, nurses
CBC
The Ontario NDP will unveil a plan Wednesday aimed at making it easier for doctors and nurses trained outside of Canada to work in their field in the province.
The proposals include measures to smooth the way for foreign-trained doctors and nurses to gain the work experience they need to get accreditation from Ontario's medical regulators.
The New Democrats are pitching the plan as a way to provide better work opportunities to skilled immigrants and to help solve the staffing challenges in Ontario's health system, problems highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
"It's absolutely a win-win," NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said in an interview Tuesday.
"We have families that don't have a family doctor. We have a health-care system falling apart for lack of front-line nurses," Horwath said.
"We have solutions for that. We just have to actually be serious about breaking down those barriers."
Thousands of foreign-trained nurses and doctors struggle to get licensed to practise in Ontario.
The NDP's proposals will include a job-matching program for internationally trained doctors to provide local experience that counts toward their CPSO accreditation. A similar program exists in Alberta.
The plan would make it easier for nurses to apply for clinical placements in Ontario and to have their international nursing experience recognized.
Horwath is scheduled to announce the plan Wednesday afternoon along with New Democrat MPP Doly Begum. The proposals are to be put into a bill called the Fairness for Ontario's Internationally Trained Workers Act, to be tabled by Begum.
"This bill puts us on a track to to get people with foreign credentials into the jobs that we know they can do," said Horwath.
Last fall, the Ford government introduced legislation to remove various barriers to employment for some foreign-trained workers, but the health-care sector was specifically excluded.
That legislation, part of the government's Working For Workers Act, became law in December. It forces the licensing bodies in such professions as law, accounting, architecture and engineering, as well as the plumbing and electrical trades, to eliminate requirements for Canadian experience.
The government created a program for 1,200 internationally trained nurses who are not yet certified in Ontario to work in hospitals, but under direct supervision.
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