Horgan making people fearful on hospital not what we need
In a recent edition of the Citizen Ray Camley presented an incorrect timeline regarding John Horgan’s re-announcement of our new hospital. He apparently attempted to instill fear in the voters of Cowichan Valley by raising the false spectre of the BC Liberals possibly cancelling the hospital project. He went on to say that this was something that Sonia Furstenau downplayed, also an incorrect statement.
In fact, the previous BC Liberal government’s health minister expressed the commitment in 2016 to funding a new Cowichan District Hospital but the general election of 2017 intervened. Following her election in 2017, Ms. Furstenau arranged for then Health Minister Adrian Dix to come to Duncan to meet with community doctors, hospital staff, hospice staff and volunteers with the Cowichan District Hospital Foundation to present their case for a new hospital. Ms. Furstenau then met regularly with the minister to encourage him to move the process along. In 2018, the government announced that the concept plan for the hospital had been approved. In August, just before Horgan called this unnecessary election, Minister Dix approved the business plan. The hospital is going ahead, regardless of who is in government.
As campaign fodder, John Horgan has re-announced a previous commitment that has been in the works for at least four years. It was unfair for him to politicize the matter and make our hardworking hospital staff fearful that the new hospital could be stopped. This is exactly the kind of politics that we don’t need, especially during a pandemic.
Drew Dangerfield
Duncan
