DAY 8 @ LONDON NORTH CENTRE: DEB MATTHEWS' RIDING!!!!

Today was definitely, without a doubt, the climax of the entire tour. WE MET WITH ONTARIO HEALTH MINISTER DEB MATTHEWS!!! In preparation for the big meeting, about 5-6 of us students held a conference call last night to discuss how we would address her. Today on the way to London, we had a pow-wow on the bus discussing different points we would bring up. We decided to focus on the students perspective (education; jobs; how Matthews has attacked and trivialized the profession) and broke it down to 5 points. The plan was to have 5 students speak about one point each, and between each speaker, the rest of the student were to chant, STOP THE CUTS! 4 times.

We arrived at her office and it was absolutely pouring rain (only adding to the drama of what was about to happen!) We made our way to the front of the building (it looked like a converted house) and began to chant again (Pharmacy Students for Patient Care! Deb Matthews doesn't care!). About 5 minutes later, the door opened and guess who came out? None other than Minister Matthews!! Wearing Liberal Red, pearls and protecting herself from the rain with a gigantic golf umbrella, Matthews emerged and walked towards us. She was very cordial and friendly as we chanted, asking the people at the front our names and introducing herself to us. It was even kind of hard not to smile! Good tactic on her part, I guess--also there was media there (A channel and Rogers TV), so I guess she had to look good for the cameras.

We then immediately launched into our plan of attack--the 5 students made their points and the rest of the students supported them by chanting energetically between each one. Matthews nodded in agreement as we talked about the impact on patient care, lost internships and jobs, and how hard we work towards our degrees--so much of our education is focused on delivering optimal patient care, and it'd be a shame if we couldn't practice it in Ontario.

After we had spoken, she addressed us, saying that she felt sorry that pharmacies were cutting our summer jobs and also that she felt that there was a lot of misleading information out there, making patients feel that services would be cut and stores closed down (I was later asked about this in a Rogers TV interview; I responded, that it's not misleading, it's reality. Pull out $300K from pharmacies in Ontario. They won't miraculously be okay. It's only realistic that they will go out of business! It's not misleading, it's the truth). She then invited 4 or 5 students to come in and have a conversation.

We decided we needed to regroup and proceeded to walk around the block, protesting. The media chased after us, and we got fully drenched! It was great though!! When we came back, Rogers TV interview me and Nadeem Remtulla, and then 5 students got the chance to speak with Minister Matthews (Michelle Lui, Rahman Hussain, Rahim Ismail, Nadeem Remtulla and Stephen Pahuta). The rest of us waited on the bus, speculating about what they could be talking about. About 20 minutes later they emerged. They told us that the meeting had gone well and they had really pressured the minister. At one point, the minister told them that she would consider extending the May 15 consultation deadline (there was no media there, however). The students said that they pressured her, and she couldn't answer some of their questions!! Her PR people actually had to end the interview since she couldn't come up with answers! We left her office triumphantly. The event was followed by an afternoon of canvassing in Chris Bentley's riding of West London.

Click the link below to watch some epic videos of our meeting with Deb Matthews!

STOP CUTS @ LONDON (THE DEB MATTHEWS EDITION)

What do me and Dalton McGuinty have in common?! We hail from the same riding (Ottawa South) Tomorrow we are hitting the road early and heading to our beautiful nation's capital and my hometown, OTTAWA, ONTARIO!! We are hitting the streets of Ottawa South so look out for the white coats!!!