Update Ontario’s Retirement Homes Act to protect seniors
TheStar.com – Opinion/Editorials – Ontario’s Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority needs the power to close down illegal retirement homes.
Nov 10 2014. Editorial
What good is legislation designed to protect vulnerable seniors if it lacks regulatory teeth?
That’s the question at the heart of a troubling story about a Toronto retirement home, formerly known as In Touch but now called Rosemount Place.
The home was ordered closed, an appeal of the order was turned down, and in May the owner-operator, Elaine Lindo, was charged with operating without a licence.
Lindo has since been to court on the case three times. And yet the home is still operating with at least 18 people in residence, according to Lindo — and is open to take on new clients.
That’s because Ontario’s Retirement Homes Regulatory Authority does not have the authority to “close or take over an unlicensed premise,” according to a spokesman for the agency.
In fact, in the end, Lindo may face only a fine under the legislation passed in 2012 to protect seniors.
This despite the fact that the authority cited “numerous concerns” about the operations of the home, including that it “abused and/or neglected several of its residents.” When Lindo took her appeal to the provincial Licence Appeal Tribunal, inspectors there found she had lied, misled inspectors and failed to bring the home into compliance with the law.
At that time, Lindo was told to stop operating the retirement home immediately, and to begin to transfer residents to other facilities, or reduce the number under her care to less than six. (Under the legislation, retirement homes with less than six people are unregulated.)
She did neither.
And there seems to be no way to force her to stop operating the home. As the tribunal noted: “There appears to be a gap in the Act that has the potential to leave the residents of In Touch Retirement unprotected.”
Monday’s story followed a 2010 Star investigative series into In Touch that found people left in urine and feces-filled diapers for hours; washrooms with no toilet paper in them so residents wiped themselves with their hands or a communal towel; bad food; and poorly trained and underpaid staff.
That story so angered then-premier Dalton McGuinty that he made putting protections in place for seniors a priority, and the Retirement Homes Act became law in 2012.
So where are we now? No further ahead, it would seem.
It’s time for some regulatory teeth that would permit regulators to go in and close down the home and transfer its residents to safe facilities. The province needs to amend its legislation.
< http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorials/2014/11/10/update_ontarios_retirement_homes_act_to_protect_seniors_editorial.html >
This entry was posted on Monday, November 10th, 2014 at 10:55 pm and is filed under Equality Debates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
Leave a Reply
Recent Comments