September 24th, 2020
September 24th, 2020
BRAMPTON — MPPs Gurratan Singh (Brampton East), Sara Singh (Brampton Centre) and Kevin Yarde (Brampton North) are calling on the government to immediately cap class sizes at 15 students, as proposed by the NDP. The call comes as Brampton, one of Ontario’s COVID-19 hotspots, sees the number of infections connected to local schools continue to grow.
“Parents in Brampton are watching anxiously as COVID-19 cases show up in more and more schools in our community,” said Gurratan Singh. “They’re worried that if the virus doesn’t show up in their child’s school today, it could tomorrow.”
“Doug Ford is making it impossible to practice physical distancing in our schools by cramming kids into crowded classrooms,” said Sara Singh. “When Brampton re-emerged as a COVID-19 hotspot, Mr. Ford told us we must not gather in groups of more than 10 indoors, so how is it okay to pack classrooms with upwards of 30 kids?”
Doug Ford’s Conservatives recently said no to a motion by Official Opposition NDP Leader Andrea Horwath proposing a class size cap of no more than 15 students. Both of Brampton’s PC MPPs, Prabmeet Sarkaria and Amarjot Sandhu, voted against giving Brampton these smaller, safer classes. Brampton’s NDP MPPs held a press conference Thursday, outside of Claireville Public School in Brampton, to urge the Ford government to reverse course.
“Brampton families can’t afford to wait any longer for safer, smaller classes,” said Yarde. “Our community has long been ignored by Liberals and Conservatives, and the government needs to fund a cap on class sizes now to help stamp out COVID-19 infections in our schools.
“The NDP will keep up the pressure until Brampton gets the resources it needs to fight COVID-19 in our schools, and in our community.”
Yarde and his fellow NDP Brampton MPPs have been pushing for provincial assistance for Peel Public Health so it can do more testing, more community outreach and more proactive workplace inspections. Yarde tabled a successful motion in the legislature last week prescribing just that, but the Ford government has so far failed to deliver on help that should have come by now.