The federal Conservative leader is rejecting the idea of imposing national standards on long term care, after thousands of nursing home residents across the country have died with COVID-19.

Erin O’Toole says the “Ottawa knows best” approach is the wrong one for dealing with the crisis in long term care, which dates back decades but has been laid bare by the pandemic.

O’Toole says the federal government needs to partner with the provinces, saying you can’t have a top down mandatory approach, since he says “this is not collaborative federalism.”

After the pandemic drew attention to horrific conditions in some nursing homes, the Trudeau Liberals in Ottawa proposed a set of national standards for long term care homes which was stalled after it met strong opposition from some premiers, most notably the premier of Quebec.

Last week, Federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh announced his intention to make national standards for long term care homes an election issue.

Singh joins Libby Znaimer on Zoomer Radio’s Fight Back Wednesday at 12:45pm. Thursday, Jagmeet Singh is among the key note speakers at the Annual General Meeting for the Zoomers’ Advocacy group CARP – A New Vision of Aging.