This is the last week for the New Brunswick legislature to sit in its current configuration, before a provincial election set for October 21.
CHMA called up Memramcook-Tantramar MLA Megan Mitton to get an update on what’s going on this week in Fredericton, including a sick days report that has yet to see the light of day, and hopes for an Accessibility Act for New Brunswick.
“It’s almost like kids getting excited about summer,” says Mitton. “I feel like the energy gets a bit different in the legislature as we get towards June.”
Mitton says that in addition to being very concerned about revelations in recent Auditor Generals reports documenting a lack of oversight of travel nurse contracts, she’s also concerned that a report into sick days legislation will get lost with the end of the session.
“They did consultations, they wrote a report, and the minister won’t release it,” says Mitton. “I think he’s going to wait till the last day we’re sitting to release it, unfortunately.”
This week the Green Party expects to debate their environmental rights bill, “which would guarantee rights to clean air, clean water, to not have to be breathing in pollution,” says Mitton. “And this would especially protect the most vulnerable, such as children, and would give recourse for people when things aren’t going that way.”
Mitton also introduced an act to ban the use of replacement workers, which she says will most likely “die on the order paper” for this session. “This is actually legislation that the Greens have tabled before,” says Mitton. “Standing up for workers rights and putting legislation forward to do that is something that’s important to us.”
