Quebec has saved $750 million this year by not outsourcing healthcare work to private agencies.
Updates from September, 2025 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
Ottawa is putting up $130 million toward getting residential construction started at Blue Bonnets. But water mains, sewers and rainfall management infrastructure have to go in first. I look forward to seeing a preliminary street map.
All told, three levels of government are ponying up $320 million to get the project moving.
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Kate
The mother of the little girl abandoned in June and found, by sheer luck, by a road in Ontario, has been declared not criminally responsible.
Later, La Presse reports that the woman wants to leave the Pinel Institute but prosecutors are opposed, saying what she did is serious and she needs to stay put and continue treatment.
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Kate
There’s bound to be city election news constantly from now till November, so I’ll be grouping it together day to day, unless there’s some huge scoop.
La Presse’s headline calls the election une course entre méconnus but the lede contradicts this immediately, pointing out that Rabouin, Martinez Ferrada and Sauvé are all already fairly well known. The article even looks at two of the fringe candidates for mayor, including Gilbert Thibodeau, one of those chronic candidates who gets a mere handful of votes every time, then stubbornly tries again (some history here).
CBC looks back at Valérie Plante’s time in office and asks how she will be remembered. As in the La Presse article, she faces criticism for unfulfilled promises, especially over housing and the state of the roads. Historically, I believe that her mayoralty will be evaluated in the context of the pandemic, which blighted some of the hope with which it began.
Ensemble launched its official campaign Sunday.
Lorraine Pintal, who used to direct the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde, will be running for Ensemble in Vieux‑Rosemont.
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Kate
Two deaf women from Montreal were killed by a train in Portugal, their deaths mourned by the Deaf community here.
azrhey
It is really sad event. I’ve been following the story since saturday in the newspapers. The general lesson though is that, deaf or hearing, pretty please, don’t cross a railway without looking both ways ( it was a rural setting so there aren’t any barriers at the road crossing ) and pretty pretty please don’t hang around on top of the rails taking selfies… or at least keep someone in your group as a lookout just in case. The train conductor apparently rang the whistle long enough that the passengers tried to look out what what happening but as it was a going in the straight line they couldn’t see anything but they never heard it.
A very sad story and with the funicular in Lisbon couple of weeks ago, not a good time for Portuguese tourism news.MarcG
I think that you want the the d in “deaf community” to be a capital (https://www.noslangues-ourlanguages.gc.ca/en/blogue-blog/perte-auditive-terminologie-hearing-loss-terminology-eng).
Kate
Does the capital derive from it being a specific community as opposed to, say, referring to Blind people or Autistic people, and who decides?
Blork
Apparently it comes down to: In this context, Deaf is a cultural descriptor, not an audiological one.
From the site that MarcG linked to:
The difference between “Deaf” and “deaf”
One such organization, The Canadian Association of the Deaf, educates us about the critical distinction between the terms “Deaf” and “deaf.” The lowercase version is simply a descriptor of an audiological state: a person is deaf. But the capital “D” version (Deaf) refers to people who identify with Deaf culture and use Sign language as their primary language. Notice the capital “S” on the word “sign” as well. The term “Sign language” refers to fully fledged languages such as American Sign Language (ASL), Langue des signes québécoise (LSQ), or Indigenous Sign languages. These languages are now officially recognized as the primary languages of communication by Deaf people in Canada.Note3
In this context, Deaf is a cultural descriptor, not an audiological one. How much Deaf people can hear or whether they speak is irrelevant. Being Deaf is not about hearing. Many Deaf people reject notions of disability and any suggestion that they have a loss. On the contrary, they have their own language, a rich culture, and a strong sense of community.
Kate
Sadly, I think their deaths were due to being deaf on a railway line, not Deaf.
MarcG
I was making the suggestion for the “mourned by the deaf community” part.
Kate
Fair enough.
Jim 17:24 on 2025-09-15 Permalink
OMG! It’s almost like if you take the profit out of healthcare, it costs less. Who would have thunk it.
jeather 17:41 on 2025-09-15 Permalink
Have to say (a) duh and (b) absolutely shocked Biron was willing to do that.
maggie rose 20:21 on 2025-09-15 Permalink
What jeather said. Is this real (too tired to read article)? Like, a bit of good news while the world appears to disintegrate. Also, hard to actually believe. Was it outsourcing that was the issue, or incentives to leave “our” healthcare, paid for with our taxes.
mare 23:26 on 2025-09-15 Permalink
They also started quotas on certain procedures. The waiting lists are getting longer.
su 05:32 on 2025-09-16 Permalink
Are some of the agencies cut, private surgery clinics?
Uatu 08:46 on 2025-09-16 Permalink
This just in: Genevieve Biron gets 750million dollar raise/s
Tim 09:33 on 2025-09-16 Permalink
@su: No. The cost savings involve not using costly nurse staffing agencies to cover labor shortages within the public health system.
jeather 18:48 on 2025-09-17 Permalink
They’re going to save even more because they are no longer covering covid vaccines for everyone (but still the flu)
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-covid-19-vaccine-free-quebec-alberta/
MarcG 19:26 on 2025-09-17 Permalink
@jeather I believe that the feds were previously paying for the vaccines and that’s the province’s excuse for charging for some of them now. We’ll end up paying for the fallout of a less-vaccinated society, though, it’ll just take a bit of time to show up on the ledger in the form of increased acute and chronic illness.
Ian 20:44 on 2025-09-17 Permalink
I’m pretty sure we’re starting to see that already at union jobs that allow long-term medical leave, it’s certainly affecting the primary and secondary school teacher workforce.
jeather 21:09 on 2025-09-17 Permalink
It’s about 6% of all adults 18-59 regardless of health status or job category who got a vaccine last year, so that’s really the maximum number of doses on top of people who will get it free, probably under four hundred thousand doses that they are saving, so about 60 million.
MarcG 07:46 on 2025-09-18 Permalink
Yeah as if the Covid vaccination rate wasn’t pitiful enough, they’re going to force it even lower. A member of a group I belong to has an immunocompromised partner who can’t be vaccinated so relies on the people around them getting it, but they’re currently unemployed and won’t be able to afford it. Another example of society’s most vulnerable being thrown to the wolves and a useful illustration of the intersection of class and disability.
jeather 09:12 on 2025-09-18 Permalink
I’m wondering exactly how they will be restricting it — I got flu vaccines for free for years without officially being eligible and the nurses did not even ask.
(For what it’s worth, I know 60 million is a lot of money, but it’s not even a rounding error in our budget deficit.)