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Housing: The housing crises is a humanitarian issue, grounded in unsustainable, inequitable and unjust social-economic systems. It reflects the increasing gap between the rich and the poor; it is an example of the consequences of an economic system that prioritizes growth and profit over people and environment. We need to adopt full-cost accounting measures that expand economic considerations to include long-term and so-called externalized costs and benefits. At the same time, we need programs to quickly establish low-cost, energy-efficient, well-sited housing options, in consultation with those most in need.
Transportation: This is the second highest contributor to the climate crisis. We need to reduce dependence on fossil-fuel powered vehicles. Initiatives are urgently needed to increase the extent, efficiency, efficacy, and affordability of public transport systems, such that using public transit is preferable to dealing with traffic, parking, and owning a vehicle. As an example of an initiative to reduce fossil-fuel dependence, the Ecology Action Centre’s call to electrify school buses is very supportable. Reducing emissions also supports better health outcomes, especially for school children.
On-going development issues: Well-planned developments are essential for a livable healthy environment. New developments should retain and restore natural land cover (parks, trails, urban forest); provide equitable access to nature for mental and physical well-being, air purification, and carbon sequestration; and include nature-based solutions to climate and biodiversity crises. Development is important but needs to be well planned to maintain and restore a network of connected green spaces throughout the city, for people and nature.
Healthcare: While attention to emergency and critical care is necessary, a shift is needed to also focus on “wellness” outcomes, to reduce the need for health “care” or “cure.” “Healthy-city-healthy-people” approaches provide ways to improve health outcomes by addressing housing, transportation, built environment, and nature-based solutions in ways that also serve to foster equitable access to nature, enhance life-supporting ecosystem services, and confront underlying causes of illness.
Two types of legislation that I would strive to enact are the Coastal Protection Act and Bill of Environmental Rights and Responsibilities.
The Coastal Protection Act - It is crucial to immediate and long-term protection and management of the coast, both for ecosystems and human communities. Climate and associated changes (e.g., sea-level rise, storm surges, erosion, flooding, increasing storm intensity and frequency) require that we undertake a coordinated province-wide strategy to adapt to and mitigate these changes in ways that are effective and equitable. Roads and other built developments will need to be relocated further inland or otherwise raised up. These relocations and adjustments will need to be made in ways that do not further jeopardize key ecosystems, such as those that support endangered species and habitats, and those that provide key ecosystem services, such as buffering the coast from storm surges and erosion, reducing runoff and flooding, and storing and sequestering carbon. Such coastal protection responses also need to be done in ways that are socially equitable and do not further disadvantage those groups that are often excluded from decision making or bear a disproportionate share of the burden of environmental disasters. The provincial government needs to take a lead role and provide the necessary legal and policy framework to take on this complex task in a highly coordinated manner.
Bill of Environmental Rights and Responsibilities - I am fully supportive of the Bill of Environmental Rights and Responsibilities proposed by East Coast Environmental Law and others. Progressive jurisdictions around the world and in Canada have implemented similar legislation. If enacted, it would enshrine the rights of all people to a healthy environment. It would provide a way for people and communities to hold government to account for things like exposure to levels of pollutants in the air, water, or land that endanger their health. This umbrella legislation would help support other existing and proposed legislation such as the Endangered Species Act Environment Act, and Coastal Protection Act. It would make the provincial government legally responsible for protecting the environment for present and future generations, while respecting and upholding the rights of Indigenous peoples.
Affordability
Food costs
Karen Beazley's promise
- Increase investment and research into climate-friendly and regenerative agricultural practices and biopesticides.
- Fund initiatives, such as community gardens, to foster agriculture in urban areas to produce more local food.
- Create incentives for farmers to implement regenerative agricultural practices, recognizing benefits of agriculture in the carbon economy.
- Empower farmers by collaborating with them to improve their capacity to sell their products in local retail markets.
Fuel and transportation costs
Karen Beazley's promise
- Initiate a long-term project for a comprehensive, multimodal transit system designed for inter-municipal travel in Nova Scotia, including buses, light rail, and ferries, and integrate this system with existing municipal transit and active transportation infrastructure.
- Collaborate with municipalities to implement or enhance mass transit systems and ensure they are integrated as much as possible with other transit options.
- Drastically increase the allocation of provincial funds for transit infrastructure, matching each dollar spent on new highway construction with a dollar spent on building transit capacity.
- Create tax incentives to build and operate public electric vehicle charging infrastructure, especially in rural areas.
Minimum wage
Karen Beazley's promise
Green MLAs will:
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
- Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
- Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
- Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.
Post-secondary costs and loans
Karen Beazley's promise
Greens believe that equitable access to postsecondary education should be provided, thereby supporting opportunities for all learners to realize their unique potential to develop into citizens who will contribute the skills, expertise, and knowledge that will sustain our communities and our province.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support retraining incentives, programmes and courses in postsecondary institutions to provide a just transition to climate change employment.
- Eliminate tuition fees at Nova Scotia Community College for Nova Scotia residents
- Work towards free tuition for all resident domestic students at all postsecondary institutions in Nova Scotia.
- Provide free postsecondary education to youth who were formerly in care.
- Provide targeted strategies for specific areas in education and students living in poverty or in care.
- Provide coherent support for emerging immigrant and refugee communities for students.
- Address factors such as housing affordability and career prospects to support transitions to green jobs in Nova Scotia in sectors such as construction, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, and forestry.
Poverty
Karen Beazley's promises
Life has become too expensive for too many Nova Scotians, and communities are suffering. It is the responsibility of every MLA to work toward innovative ways to tackle issues like poverty, food insecurity, and housing.
Solutions will focus on the cost of living, poverty elimination, food security, housing, supports for homelessness, and job security, alongside the transition to a Green economy.
Green MLAs won;; work with other MLAs and all Nova Scotians to:
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
- Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
- Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
- Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.
Public transit
Karen Beazley's promises
Cost of Living and Housing
Karen Beazley's promise
Life has become too expensive for too many Nova Scotians, and communities are suffering. The housing crisis has reached an alarming scale, and the need for non-market housing is undeniable.
It is the responsibility of every MLA to work toward innovative ways to tackle issues like poverty, food insecurity, and housing. Solutions will focus on the cost of living, poverty elimination, food security, housing, supports for homelessness, and job security, alongside the transition to a Green economy.
Climate Change & the Environment
Carbon price
Karen Beazley's promise
Climate adaptation
Karen Beazley's promises
Natural forests and wetlands are crucial to carbon storage and sequestration. They are needed to offset historical carbon emissions, and to reduce current and future emissions that would occur with their disturbance, conversion, or use as fuel.
Retention and restoration of natural areas are core aspects of enabling wildlife and ecosystems to adapt to climate changes, such as by providing avenues for them to shift to cooler places as the climate warms.
Nature-based solutions are key to addressing both climate and biodiversity emergencies, as well as supporting human well-being, ecosystem services, and our ecological life-supporting system.
Adaptation responses need to be done in ways that are socially equitable and do not further disadvantage those groups that are often excluded from decision making or bear a disproportionate share of the burden of environmental disasters.
The provincial government needs to take a lead role and provide the necessary legal and policy framework to take on this complex task in a highly coordinated manner.
Climate and associated changes (e.g., sea-level rise, storm surges, erosion, flooding, increasing storm intensity and frequency) require that we undertake a coordinated province-wide strategy to adapt to and mitigate these changes in ways that are effective and equitable.
Roads and other built developments will need to be relocated further inland or otherwise raised up. These relocations and adjustments will need to be made in ways that do not further jeopardize key ecosystems, such as those that support endangered species and habitats, and those that provide key ecosystem services.
Key natural areas that buffer the coast from storm surges and erosion, reduce runoff and flooding, and store and sequester carbon need to be protected .
Conservation and environmental protection
Karen Beazley's promises
Electric vehicles
Karen Beazley's promises
Forests and forest conservation
Karen Beazley's promises
- Collaborate with researchers and the forestry industry to develop more sustainable forestry practices.
- Support measures to ensure the legislated elimination of clearcutting forestry practices.
- Support facilitation of best practices silviculture on public and private land forestry and for old-forest restoration.
- Urge legislation preventing toxic agents, such as glyphosate, from being applied to fields and forests.
- Urge legislation preventing the use of forest biomass for the purpose of electricity generation both domestically and abroad.
- Require both survey-based and molecular-based assessments of forest health and monitoring of invasive or destructive species.
Green construction and retrofits
Karen Beazley's promises
Oil and gas development
Karen Beazley's promise
Pollution
Karen Beazley's promises
Public transit
Karen Beazley's promises
Reducing greenhouse gas emissions
Karen Beazley's promises
Walkable, bikable communities
Karen Beazley's promises
Water and watersheds
Karen Beazley's promises
Wildfires
Karen Beazley's promise
Education about human roles and responsibilities surrounding wildfire, its causes, and preventive measures is key. Development, monitoring, and enforcement of policies to address causes and support preventive measures are needed.
Education
Indigenous learning
Karen Beazley's promise
Collaborations for learning begin with our treaty obligations on shared Mi’kmaw territory. Our educational policies and practices must recognize and honour Indigenous ecological knowledge and agreements for sharing as expressed in Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action.
I and the Green Party express our gratitude to the Mi’kmaq for sharing their understanding of msit no’kmaq, the interconnectedness of all things. We will strive to emphasize this concept through inclusive learning, integrated curriculum, and safe, respectful, healthy, and sustainable indoor and outdoor learning environments.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action for education in consultation with survivors, Indigenous peoples, and educators by:
- Developing age-appropriate curriculum for grade primary to grade 12 students on residential “schools,” Treaties, and Indigenous people’s historical and contemporary contributions to Canada,
- Providing the necessary funding to postsecondary institutions to educate teachers on how to integrate Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods into classrooms,
- Providing the necessary funding to First Nations schools to utilize Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods in classrooms,
- Providing an education on comparative religious studies, including a segment on Indigenous spiritual beliefs and practices developed in collaboration with Elders.
- Aim to rebuild our educational system by participating in community-based consultative processes for decision-making that include Mi’kmaq, African Nova Scotian communities, Acadian, 2SLGBTQQIA+, disabled, and newcomer communities, early childhood educators, teachers, school staff, and representative unions, parents, students, and community members.
- Introduce targeted training and programmes related to respect for diversity, anti-oppression, and anti-racism.
- Develop a whole school approach that introduces environmental studies and climate action as an integrated and cross-curricular subject at all grade levels, from primary to 12, in partnership with Mi’kmaw communities and in consultation with school-based and community groups.
Post-secondary costs and loans
Karen Beazley's promise
Greens believe that equitable access to postsecondary education should be provided, thereby supporting opportunities for all learners to realize their unique potential to develop into citizens who will contribute the skills, expertise, and knowledge that will sustain our communities and our province.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support retraining incentives, programmes and courses in postsecondary institutions to provide a just transition to climate change employment.
- Eliminate tuition fees at Nova Scotia Community College for Nova Scotia residents
- Work towards free tuition for all resident domestic students at all postsecondary institutions in Nova Scotia.
- Provide free postsecondary education to youth who were formerly in care.
- Provide targeted strategies for specific areas in education and students living in poverty or in care.
- Provide coherent support for emerging immigrant and refugee communities for students.
- Address factors such as housing affordability and career prospects to support transitions to green jobs in Nova Scotia in sectors such as construction, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, and forestry.
Post-secondary institutions
Karen Beazley's promise
The Green Party of Nova Scotia believes that education should ensure equitable access to programs and resources for lifelong learning, including in postsecondary institutions. Inclusive education means supporting opportunities for all learners to realize their unique potential to develop into citizens who will contribute the skills, expertise, and knowledge that will sustain our communities and our province.
Consultation and collaboration begins with our treaty obligations on shared Mi’kmaw territory. Our educational policies and practices must recognize and honour Indigenous ecological knowledge and agreements for sharing as expressed in Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action. We express our gratitude to the Mi’kmaq for sharing their understanding of msit no’kmaq, the interconnectedness of all things, and strive to emphasize this concept through inclusive learning, integrated curriculum, and safe, respectful, healthy, and sustainable indoor and outdoor learning environments.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action for education in consultation with survivors, Indigenous peoples, and educators by:
- Developing appropriate post-secondary programs and courses on Indigenous knowledges, Treaties, and Indigenous people’s historical and contemporary contributions to Canada, by participating in community-based consultative processes for decision-making that include the Mi’kmaq.
- Address factors such as housing affordability, career prospects, and lower-than-average wage growth to support green transitions in Nova Scotia.
- Support retraining incentives, programmes and courses in postsecondary institutions to provide a just transition to climate change employment.
- Work towards free tuition for all resident domestic students at all postsecondary institutions in Nova Scotia.
- Provide free postsecondary education to youth who were formerly in care.
Post-secondary student housing
Karen Beazley's promise
I will support initiatives to quickly establish low-cost, energy-efficient, well-sited housing options to support green transitions in Nova Scotia.
School safety
Karen Beazley's promise
Many Nova Scotians have concerns about unsafe school and classroom conditions and incidents, insufficient levels of staffing and resources for all learners, and governmental disregard for responding to local needs. This crisis has worsened due to inadequate funding, struggles of families and individuals for basic necessities, and lack of governmental consultation and informed decision-making.
Green MLAs will work with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Introduce targeted training and programmes related to respect for diversity, anti-oppression, and anti-racism.
- Support initiatives that address the Nova Scotia Teachers’ Union’s demands for dealing with and preventing school violence, including provision for adequate human resources, clear consequences for incidents of violence, clear reporting requirements and safe and secure responses related to lock down and evacuation, and province-wide training dedicated to school safety.
Student mental health
Karen Beazley's promise
Inclusive education
Karen Beazley's promise
Many Nova Scotians have concerns about classroom conditions and incidents, insufficient levels of staffing and resources for all learners, and governmental disregard for responding to local needs. This crisis has worsened due to inadequate funding, struggles of families and individuals for basic necessities, and lack of governmental consultation and informed decision-making.
A quality public education system needs to prioritize safety, justice, and purposeful learning, leading to the social and environmental change crucial to wellbeing.
Greens believe that education should ensure equitable access to programs and resources for lifelong learning throughout early childhood, elementary and secondary, postsecondary, and beyond in adulthood. Inclusive education means supporting opportunities for all learners to realize their unique potential to develop into citizens who will contribute the skills, expertise, and knowledge that will sustain our communities and our province.
Consultation and collaboration begins with our treaty obligations on shared Mi’kmaw territory. Our educational policies and practices must recognize and honour Indigenous ecological knowledge and agreements for sharing as expressed in Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action. We express our gratitude to the Mi’kmaq for sharing their understanding of msit no’kmaq, the interconnectedness of all things, and strive to emphasize this concept through inclusive learning, integrated curriculum, and safe, respectful, healthy, and sustainable indoor and outdoor learning environments.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action for education in consultation with survivors, Indigenous peoples, and educators by:
- Developing age-appropriate curriculum for grade primary to grade 12 students on residential “schools,” Treaties, and Indigenous people’s historical and contemporary contributions to Canada,
- Providing the necessary funding to postsecondary institutions to educate teachers on how to integrate Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods into classrooms,
- Providing the necessary funding to First Nations schools to utilize Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods in classrooms,
- Providing an education on comparative religious studies, including a segment on Indigenous spiritual beliefs and practices developed in collaboration with Elders.
- Aim to rebuild our educational system by participating in community-based consultative processes for decision-making that include Mi’kmaq, African Nova Scotian communities, Acadian, 2SLGBTQQIA+, disabled, and newcomer communities, early childhood educators, teachers, school staff, and representative unions, parents, students, and community members.
- Introduce targeted training and programmes related to respect for diversity, anti-oppression, and anti-racism.
- Invest in licensed child care expansion in the not-for-profit and public sector to build a publicly-managed and publicly delivered system.
- Support initiatives that address the Nova Scotia Teachers’ Union’s demands for dealing with and preventing school violence, including provision for adequate human resources, clear consequences for incidents of violence, clear reporting requirements and safe and secure responses related to lock down and evacuation, and province-wide training dedicated to school safety.
- Accelerate recruitment of Student Support Workers by improving working conditions and ensuring that they receive fair, competitive compensation that recognizes the passion and dedication demanded of their roles.
- Develop a whole school approach that introduces environmental studies and climate action as an integrated and cross-curricular subject at all grade levels, from primary to 12, in partnership with Mi’kmaw communities and in consultation with school-based and community groups.
- Provide guidance and supports for current and future school/ community gardens in all schools, or alternatively communities, in the province to promote food security, environmental sustainability, lifelong healthy food choices, social inclusion, life skills, the arts, and all subject areas, through integrated curricular action plans and inquiry and project-based learning on a classroom as well as a school-wide basis.
- Initiate an environmental assessment and plan for the environmentally sustainable greening of schoolyards as outdoor spaces for integrated environmental action, project based learning and safe learning spaces in all subject areas.
- Support opportunities for learners to develop skills in critical thinking, communication, collaboration, creative problem solving, and citizenship.
- Expand school-based arts programmes including visual, musical, performing, and dramatic arts.
- Provide provincially-approved education resources for homeschoolers, and children and youth in care.
- Provide targeted strategies for specific areas in education such as rural education, French language instruction, and students living in poverty or in care.
- Provide appropriate resources to the Conseil Scolaire Acadien Provincial (CSAP) including for the promotion of the French language outside the classrooms in youth leadership activities and community development activities.
- Provide coherent support for emerging immigrant and refugee communities for students, parents, and teachers.
- Initiate a workforce planning strategy to recruit and train teachers who work in marginalized and underserved communities.
- Address factors such as housing affordability, career prospects, and lower-than-average wage growth to support transitions to green jobs in Nova Scotia in sectors such as construction, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, and forestry.
- Support retraining incentives, programmes and courses in postsecondary institutions to provide a just transition to climate change employment.
- Restore trades and other skills-based curricula in intermediate and high schools, and expand paid apprenticeships and co-op placement programmes incorporating green skills and knowledge.
- Increase access to adult learning and lifelong education through providing staff and resources to address learning goals and needs related to literacy, numeracy, upgrading, computer literacy, skills training, and English as an Additional Language learning, among others.
- Eliminate tuition fees at Nova Scotia Community College for Nova Scotia residents and work towards free tuition for all resident domestic students at all postsecondary institutions in Nova Scotia.
- Provide free postsecondary education to youth who were formerly in care.
Health & Healthcare
Long-term care
Karen Beazley's promise
- Decrease prolonged emergency room care by relieving a key blockage point – those waiting for long-term care (LTC) – by increasing the number of public or not-for-profit beds.
- Implement options for decreasing costs and concerns to quality of care, such as through increased public oversight of LTC, including ensuring standard 4.1 hours per resident.
- Renegotiate federal Canada Health Transfer payments to ensure adequate funding to increase training and expand programs.
Mental health
Karen Beazley's promise
- Affiliate clinics with not-for-profit community organizations and professionals who have a focus on prevention and wellbeing such as health and physical educators.
- Train for dedicated roles to enhance transgender and gender affirming healthcare.
- Support teachers and guidance counselors in identifying and addressing mental health and behavioural concerns in schools.
- Improve addiction and mental health services and ensure that all private services have adequate oversight and that there will be ongoing follow-up.
- Ensure that those struggling with chronic conditions receive specialized care with ongoing follow-up.
- Advocate for key care priorities including: help break down stigma; improve the diagnosis experience; and increase investments across the care continuum for people living with mental illness and their care partners.
Public Health and Wellness
Karen Beazley's promise
Nova Scotia’s healthcare system is in crisis, with patients facing long wait times, a shortage of professionals, and increasing privatization. There has been a failure to value the fundamental right to comprehensive, publicly delivered and accessible health services that Nova Scotians once relied on. Erosion has resulted from insufficient funding, inadequate planning for training of professionals and for failures to address the determinants of health, poverty being foremost among them. Nova Scotians need services beyond just physicians and hospitals. They deserve a prevention first approach which values the physical, emotional, psychological, social, and spiritual aspects of wellbeing.
We will work to stop further privatization of healthcare and gradually reverse our reliance on private healthcare providers. Resisting privatization will result in public services that are more personal, of better quality, with sufficient staffing, and overall less costly than private services. We will collaborate with communities, healthcare advocates, unions, universities, and other governments to ensure that we have sustainable staffing and planning for prevention and management of pandemics, health crises and climate-related events affecting health and wellbeing.
The health and wellbeing of Nova Scotians is deeply connected to the health of our environment and communities. True health includes a livable income, nutritious food, clean air and water, safe homes, strong communities, and protection from climate disasters.
We will support collaborative clinics and team-based family practices in communities. These will be staffed by diverse types of healthcare professionals tailored to meet community needs and will be affiliated with not-for-profit community organizations and health-related professionals who have a focus on prevention and wellbeing, such as health and physical educators. Services will be focused on inclusive access including provision to those most marginalized such as Black, Indigenous, People of Colour (BIPOC), seniors, and those with ability challenges, vulnerable mental health, or needing gender-affirming care.
We will collaborate to move from the health and wellbeing crisis to a sustainable and effective model which works for all Nova Scotians.
Comprehensive, Publicly Delivered and Accessible Services
Karen Beazley's promise
Nova Scotia is now purchasing virtual health care from Maple, a privately operated service partially owned by Loblaw Companies Limited. This service is expensive, and profits companies and their shareholders at the expense of Nova Scotian taxpayers. Virtual healthcare is a useful component of accessible and affordable healthcare delivery but should be owned by Nova Scotians and delivered as an integrated part of our public healthcare system.
Most long-term care in Nova Scotia is privately operated by large corporations but paid for by Nova Scotian tax dollars. This prioritizes the profits of shareholders over human wellbeing. The COVID-19 pandemic showed us how profit-motivated low staffing levels, often shuffling minimal staff from one site to another, contributed to much higher rates of resident mortality and staff illness than in public and not-for-profit facilities.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Value healthcare workers by listening to their needs, and improving working conditions including salaries, benefits, retention bonuses, flexible hours, work-from-home options in a public virtual service where appropriate.
- Focus efforts for increasing the number of healthcare workers on incentives for recruitment and retention, including through increased relief of student debt for medicine, dentistry, physiotherapy, and nursing for greater designated periods of service within the province.
- Increase, in consultation with healthcare providers, the number of seats for both medical and nursing schools in Nova Scotia universities, as well as working to expand spaces in residency programs, and work towards developing better routes for those wishing to learn and practice medicine in French or Mi’kmaq.
- Plan for future growth by further increasing medical and other healthcare professional education positions and upskilling opportunities, including language training, and subsidizing their costs.
- Decreasing prolonged emergency room care by relieving a key blockage point – those waiting for long-term care (LTC) – by increasing the number of public or not-for-profit beds.
- Decrease privatized services gradually as the increases in public services are sufficient, with the eventual complete phase-out of private medical clinics and services falling under the Canada Health Act.
- Implement other options for decreasing costs and concerns to quality of care, such as through increased public delivery of services like paramedicine and increased oversight of services like LTC, including ensuring standard 4.1 hours per resident.
- Renegotiate federal Canada Health Transfer payments to ensure adequate funding to eliminate privatization, increase training, better prepare for health crises, and expand programs.
Improving the Public System
Karen Beazley's promise
Greens understand that collaboration with communities, healthcare advocates, unions and various government departments is necessary to ensure that we have sustainable staffing, are meeting the needs for service delivery and planning for the future.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Support collaborative clinics and team-based family practices in communities.
- Hire and train provincial health navigators to direct patients to appropriate health services, especially mental health services.
- Work toward including dental care, pharmacare, and assistive communication supports such as hearing aids in provincial health insurance.
- Call for a review of cybersecurity around patient data in the province to avoid breaches and protect the privacy of patients.
- Review licensing requirements for externally-trained healthcare providers, inviting representatives from the appropriate agencies and unions, to make the process easier for them to register in Nova Scotia while still upholding a proper standard of care.
- Staff clinics with diverse healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, physician assistants, midwives, social workers, dietitians, pharmacists, and community paramedics, tailored to meet community needs.
- Fund clinics to allow them to provide additional services such as laboratory testing and routine care, and to remain open on weekends.
- Improve access to mental health services for all Nova Scotians, especially those without a family doctor.
- Affiliate clinics with not-for-profit community organizations and professionals who have a focus on prevention and wellbeing such as health and physical educators.
- Establish women’s health centres to address women’s unique healthcare needs and reduce barriers to abortion and reproductive health services.
- Provide universal access to midwifery services.
- Train for dedicated roles to enhance transgender and gender affirming healthcare.
- Support teachers and guidance counselors in identifying and addressing mental health and behavioural concerns in schools.
- Improve addiction and mental health services and ensure that all private services have adequate oversight and that there will be ongoing follow-up.
- Ensure that those struggling with chronic conditions such as MS, arthritis, dementia and long-COVID receive specialized care with ongoing follow-up.
- Advocate for key dementia care priorities including: help break down stigma; improve the diagnosis experience; encourage Dementia Friendly Community developments, and increase investments across the care continuum for people living with dementia and their care partners.
Increasing prevention
Karen Beazley's promise
The Green Party of Nova Scotia asserts that our healthcare system can provide services which are sustainably affordable and sufficient if we pay close attention to the determinants of health: income and social status, employment and working conditions, education and literacy, childhood experiences, physical environments, social supports and coping skills, healthy behaviours, access to health services, gender, culture and race/racism.
The key determinant of health is poverty. Healthy families require nutritious food, healthy environments and supports to live productive, fulfilling lives. Current income assistance programs in Nova Scotia fail to prevent poverty or stem the trend of increasing poverty in Nova Scotia.
Green MLAs will collaborate with other MLAs and Nova Scotians to:
- Work with other Maritime provinces to eliminate daylight saving time, reducing poor health outcomes associated with twice-yearly time changes.
- Adopt measurement(s) of wellbeing such as the Genuine Progress Indicator, rather than just purely economic measures like GDP.
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income.
- Protect students, long-term care residents and patients at hospitals by creating an Indoor Air Quality Act.
- Support seniors to continue active, healthy lives in their own homes or in quality, community-based assisted living if needed.
- Support marginalized communities with access to air conditioning, affordable healthy food and environments free of toxic pollutants.
- Electrify school bus fleets to reduce exposure of school-age children to automobile emissions, following similar Green-led efforts in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.
- Promote healthy life-styles and exercise with early interventional approaches to mental and physical health.
Housing & Homelessness
Post-secondary student housing
Karen Beazley's promise
I will support initiatives to quickly establish low-cost, energy-efficient, well-sited housing options to support green transitions in Nova Scotia.
Poverty
Karen Beazley's promises
Life has become too expensive for too many Nova Scotians, and communities are suffering. It is the responsibility of every MLA to work toward innovative ways to tackle issues like poverty, food insecurity, and housing.
Solutions will focus on the cost of living, poverty elimination, food security, housing, supports for homelessness, and job security, alongside the transition to a Green economy.
Green MLAs won;; work with other MLAs and all Nova Scotians to:
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
- Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
- Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
- Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.
Jobs, Businesses, & Labour
Minimum wage
Karen Beazley's promise
Green MLAs will:
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
- Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
- Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
- Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.
Oil and gas development
Karen Beazley's promise
Poverty
Karen Beazley's promises
Life has become too expensive for too many Nova Scotians, and communities are suffering. It is the responsibility of every MLA to work toward innovative ways to tackle issues like poverty, food insecurity, and housing.
Solutions will focus on the cost of living, poverty elimination, food security, housing, supports for homelessness, and job security, alongside the transition to a Green economy.
Green MLAs won;; work with other MLAs and all Nova Scotians to:
- Work with the federal government and other provinces to develop and implement a Guaranteed Liveable Income plan for Nova Scotia, which is universal, unconditional, complementary to other programs, provides for basic needs, and respects human dignity.
- Ensure that measures of liveable income account for food, clothing, shelter, and other resources that facilitate social engagement, such as access to travel and means of communication.
- Reduce the number of hours before workers are guaranteed overtime pay from 48 to 42 hours.
- Require that all owed vacation time and overtime be paid out when an employee quits, is laid off, or is terminated.
Biography
Throughout my career, I have been engaged in numerous professional, community, and volunteer organizations. For 15 years I chaired Nova Scotia’s Land Legacy Trust, which has provided game-changing matching funding support to land trusts to protect private lands of ecological significance. I have twice served on Recovery Planning Teams for species at risk in Nova Scotia. I have helped organize international conferences, and provided guidance to Parks Canada and Environment and Climate Change Canada, most recently for Canada’s National Ecological Corridors Program.
My interests have always focused on the inter-relationships between humans and our environment. Primarily I have centered on wildlife and natural ecosystems and our responsibilities as humans to think and act in ways that recognize that we are all related. The biological diversity that makes up ecological systems comprises our life-support system. My work has explored and advocated for ways to live in co-existence, for the benefit of all, both people and nature. I have focused on nature-based approaches to address both the climate and biodiversity crises in socially just ways.
I have always enjoyed outdoor activities, especially backcountry camping, canoeing, hiking, and sea kayaking. I have done a lot of long-distance running, swimming and biking, including the Boston Marathon, and competing for Team Canada in international triathlon and duathlon competitions, earning an award of excellence and a bronze medal for Canada in 2013.
Reason for running
At this point, we are essentially and literally talking about the survival of people and the planet as we know it. We are now near or beyond the tipping point of collapse of major planetary systems (i.e., climate; biodiversity). We need to work together to turn this ship around, for the good of people and the plant.
I have a lifetime of lived experience, skills, and knowledge across these domains. I am now retired, with time to serve in a different way towards creating and supporting these crucial changes towards a more sustainable and equitable future.
We need to transform social, economic and political systems in fundamental ways to address the interrelated climate, biodiversity, and humanitarian emergencies. The necessary transformative shift will only come about by thinking and acting differently than the status quo.
Genuine commitment to core values of social justice, equity, sustainability - deep understanding of these issues at local and global levels, and the interconnections among them
Strong relationships within diverse communities: nongovernmental and governmental organizations; academia; Indigenous communities
Professional, scholarly, and lived skills, knowledge and experience in these issues, both their causes and solutions, over many decades
Deep sense of responsibility to preserving and restoring the natural world—biodiversity—our ecological life-support system—for current and future generations of all peoples (i.e., Indigenous, Black and Other Peoples of Colour; LGBTQ2S+) and all species and ecosystems. Nature-based solutions are key.
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