Wettlaufer inquiry commission comes to London today

The provincial commission tasked with the upcoming inquiry into the actions of serial killer Elizabeth Wettlaufer will hold the last of three community meetings in London, Ont. Thursday.

It follows two community meetings held in Woodstock, Ont. on Wednesday where top Ontario court judge EileenGillesemade her first public appearance as head of the provincial commission.

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"It is important that we acknowledge how difficult it is for everyone in this community to have the knowledge that Elizabeth Wettlaufercommitted these offences while working as a trusted caregiver and a registered nurse," she said.

Wettlaufer is currently serving eight concurrent life terms for giving eight seniors in her care lethal doses of insulin while she was working as a nurse on the night shift at long-term care homes in Woodstock and London, Ont.

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Gilleseexplained that the three meetings were scheduled for the public to learn something about the people on the commission, to ask questions and offer insight on the effect that Wettlaufer's actions had.

"Long-term care is in crisis. We've been in crisis for years," Kathy DeDecker, a personal support worker who works at a long-term care home in Oxford County,told the commission Wednesday.

"I have two hands and I give them gladly at my job," she said, her voice cracking with emotion. "My residents have worked hard their whole lives, some have fought for their country and many have seen hardships this generation has never experienced."

'They deserve the best of everything'

"They deserve the best of everything," she said. "They are vulnerable, they don't always have a voice."

"I've worked in long-term care for 19 years and things are progressively getting worse with cut downs and we definitely need a minimum standard of care."

It wasn't just caregivers who spoke to the commission on Wednesday, so too did the relatives of Elizabeth Wetlaufer's victims.

ArpadHorvath'slate father was killed by Wettlauferwhile he was a patient in her care in 2014.

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"These people who were murdered were loved," he told the commissioners. "These people helped establish this country, they helped build it and the way they're treated is deplorable."

"The quality of care sure as hell doesn't exist nowadays because there's no accountability, nobody wants to answer for it, nobody wants to do anything about it. They just want toshift our old people under the carpet."

'It's disgusting'

"It's disgusting in a country that's so modern it just celebrated its 150th anniversary," he said. "In other countries seniors are treated like gold."

The upcoming inquiry will not only investigate the events that led up to Elizabeth Wettlaufer's crimes, commissioners will also examine the circumstances that allowed them to occur.It will then issue a number of recommendations to the Ontario government.

Before that happens, commissioners must still hold participation hearings and a series of consultationsto determine which individuals and groups will participate in the formal inquiry, for which no date has been set.

Justice Gillesemust deliver her report to the Ontario government by July 31, 2019.