Doctor shortage exposes old thinking on health

In the past month, several hospitals have gone through ‘emergency-room emergencies’, due to their inability to find doctors.

A week ago, a Kitchener hospital came within hours of closing its emergency room because it was unable to find doctors to staff it.

This doctor shortage prompted a Cambridge hospital to contract a private company to run its emergency room – a solution the government endorsed. In response to questions on his new-found embrace of private healthcare, Premier McGuinty threw in the towel. Since then, my colleagues in the Opposition Caucus have applied consistent pressure on the Premier, urging him to take the doctor shortage seriously. The doctor shortage has been Opposition Leader John Tory’s top priority since the Legislature reconvened on September 25.

Now that we have passed the third anniversary of the McGuinty government, it’s time to reflect and take stock of the progress – or lack thereof – made since the election.

Over the years, each party has developed its own ‘home-turf’ policy issues. When we were in government, we were known as the party that would get tough on crime, keep our promises, cut taxes, and balance the budget.

For its part, the McGuinty government continues to portray itself as the party of healthcare. But, after three years in office, Ontarians are still waiting to see results.

In his first budget as Premier, Mr. McGuinty made his health care formula well known – he gave Ontarians the largest tax increase in history, followed by the creation of an extra layer of healthcare bureaucracy, with the assumption that higher taxes and more bureaucrats would cure our healthcare crisis.

Unfortunately, that formula has been a disaster. I have always believed that doctors and health professionals – not bureaucrats and politicians – are the central components of our healthcare system. After three years under Premier McGuinty’s government, Ontario is facing an acute shortage of physicians.

For information on signing the Official Opposition petition on solving the doctor shortage, send me an email at toby@tobybarrett.com.

Ontarians are asking a number of important questions. They want to know why they are paying the McGuinty health-tax, especially when the doctor shortage is getting worse. They are asking why the Premier is spending so much money on the new health bureaucracies, when the Minister of Health won’t commit to an emergency-room wait-time guarantee. And they are realizing that when it comes to healthcare, the McGuinty government has a better record of making promises than it does of keeping them.

The doctor shortage is a serious threat locally, and in rural communities throughout the province. Larger urban hospitals often have greater resources, which allows them to offer salary ‘top-ups’ for their emergency room doctors. Unable to compete with these ‘top-ups’, rural hospitals have a harder time staffing their emergency rooms.

In the Ontario Legislature, this worsening crisis in healthcare has dramatically changed the nature of debate. Under relentless questioning about his inability to come to grips with the doctor shortage, the Minister of Health is still trying to blame everybody but himself – going as far as blaming a government that was elected back in 1990.

But the reality is that Premier McGuinty has lost credibility on the healthcare file. With taxes up, and access to doctors down, Ontarians realize that increasing taxes and bureaucracy is not the answer.