Billion dollars to eHealth warrants an Inquiry

Five years ago the Gomery Inquiry into the federal sponsorship scandal revealed hundreds of millions of Canadian taxpayers dollars going into party-friendly advertising firms and Crown corporations for little or no work.

Today, we see $1billion squandered on a network of Ontario government friends and insiders for an eHealth system that shows no results. Thus I join Opposition Leader Tim Hudak in calling for a public inquiry to answer the questions the Auditor General couldn’t address in his report on the eHealth mess.

The value of an inquiry is that it can be a way to find out what happened – to look back, as well as to look forward -- and propose policy reform…all the while conducted in public view and with the participation of the public.

While Auditor General Jim McCarter pointed to uncontrolled spending and no significant results, he lacked the mandate to answer many of the important questions about the dollars funnelled to consultants.

This was the report that highlighted the fact that the one consultant eHealth had employed in 2002/03 grew to a whopping 328 consultant contracts by 2008/09. Further, at the time of its amalgamation into the eHealth Ontario agency in April 2009, the Ministry had more than 300 eHealth consultants on contract, as compared to only 27 eHealth employees.

Given the potentially criminal behaviour hinted at in the Auditor General’s report, including potential collusion and bid-rigging, as well as the instances of overt obstruction of the Auditor General’s probe, only an independent, impartial public inquiry with a full mandate to subpoena testimony and documents will provide the answers the people of Ontario need.

Some may recall this past spring when I called for an inquiry, “into the administration of justice, law enforcement and the ownership of land within the former Haldimand Tract and nearby areas.”  While the ‘Truth about Caledonia Act, 2009’  was designed to attain long sought-after answers and prevent “attempts of intimidation, and related activities”  in similar circumstances, the bill was defeated as 39 government members filed in to dutifully fulfill their leaders direction and vote against an inquiry.

I continue to be asked, given the expense and wasted dollars, why an eHealth system is so important. The Auditor General’s report, while slamming government for wasted spending and bidding practices, cites some important examples of why an electronic health registry is key:

With drug reactions listed as the fourth largest cause of death in Ontario, we need a plan that, “allows doctors to prescribe medications electronically, generates patient medication profiles, checks for allergy and drug-to-drug interactions, eliminates errors resulting from legibility problems, reduces dosing errors, and improves the management of complex therapies.”

As well, government estimates of an increase of 69% over the last 10 years in diabetes, underline the need for Diabetes Registry. A Registry would compile diabetes patient and health-care-provider data, enable electronic monitoring of adherence to best diabetes-management practices, and provide alerts to providers when best practices are not being followed.

It’s my hope that a public inquiry will clear the air on a billion dollars worth of serious unanswered questions while paving the way for development of a cost-effective eHealth strategy that bears results.
I’m not sure we can afford to do otherwise.