Mayor Tory calls for national mental health summit amidst rash of violent incidents

With headlines of disturbing youth violence and recurring TTC attacks leaving Torontonians aghast, Mayor John Tory is calling for a national mental health summit.

While Toronto has seen some particularly headline-grabbing incidents, like the fatal swarming of a man at the hands of a group of teen girls and a fatal, random subway stabbing, Tory notes that the “mental health crisis” is a Canada-wide issue that must be collectively addressed.

“I believe our country’s leaders — Mayors, Ministers, Premiers, and the Prime Minister — need to come together in a national summit to discuss how we can better coordinate across governments to support Canadians living with mental health and substance addiction challenges,” Tory said in a statement released on Wednesday, the same day that a person chased two TTC employee’s with a syringe.

“This summit must be the moment we start treating mental health care as health care. That we clearly decide on who has responsibility to do what, and to get on with doing much more together.”

RELATED: Random TTC attacks causing ‘irreparable harm,’ union calling for harsher penalties

Tory’s statement included statistics on the increased need for psychological services, citing the Ontario Psychological Association, which says around 900,000 young people in Ontario are living with mental illness.

“According the CAMH one in two Canadians have, or have had, a mental illness by the time they reach 40 years of age,” Tory noted.

We’re facing a mental health crisis in Canada and we’re seeing the effects of it in Toronto every day.

I’ve been discussing these issues for years now, but with the current mental health crisis, today is an appropriate day for a more detailed statement: https://t.co/bf6jpyF79W pic.twitter.com/VFpk0v6Sg2

— John Tory (@JohnTory) January 25, 2023

On Wednesday, the province announced that it’s expanding mental health services for children and youth, investing $4.75 million into the “One Stop Talk” program which connects at-risk youth to mental health counselling by phone, video, text and chat.

“Our government is making it easier and more convenient for children and youth in every corner of the province to access mental health care,” Sylvia Jones, Deputy Premier and Minister of Health, said in a release.

“This program offers modern, convenient options for youth to connect to help in ways that they’re used to communicating.”

Mayor Tory also pointed out the escalating drug abuse crisis that’s hit Toronto, and other Ontario cities, with disturbing surges in fatal overdoses.

“Nationally, from January to June of last year, 32,632 Canadians lost their lives as a result of opioid-related deaths, with 90 per cent of them occurring in B.C., Alberta, and Ontario — opioid overdoses now account for more deaths in Canada than car accidents,” Tory said. “We can’t just recite these numbers, we need to do more.”

He also not-so-subtly hinted that more money is needed from the other levels of government to assure mental health care is properly funded.

“When the federal and provincial governments don’t fully and adequately fund mental health care, the responsibility is offloaded to ill-equipped municipalities across Canada which are without the financial resources to address this crisis – it is offloaded to our shelters, to our police services, to our transit systems, and to hospital emergency departments.”

“The lack of spending on mental health – particularly as we come out of the COVID-19 pandemic – is painfully clear on the streets of municipalities across the country.”

Tory also called out Justin Trudeau’s government for failing to deliver on a commitment for more federal cash.

“In the 2021 federal election, we heard a commitment for permanent, ongoing funding for mental health services under the Canada Mental Health Transfer for $4.5 billion over five years — a commitment which has yet to come to life,” Tory said.

“The time is now for our governments who fund and deliver health care at the federal and provincial level to take real action with serious, long-term funding, to support mental health and addictions treatment across our country.”