For Immediate Release:
February 23, 2006

Barrett concerned about new health bureaucracies
Says bill 36 would centralize decisions with unelected government appointees

Queen’s Park—MPP Toby Barrett spoke out against the Ontario government’s Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) scheme to create large regionalized health bureaucracies yesterday in the Legislature.

Barrett is upset that the provincial government is forging ahead with its plan to create huge bureaucracies that will operate in a similar fashion to school boards- only much larger and without regular elections.  Legislation to create Local Health Integration Networks is presently being debated.

“First of all, it’s the irrational size,” Barrett told the legislature.  “Being a rural member, I really have problems getting my mind around a neighborhood of 1.3 million people.”

“I have some concern for the administration of Norfolk County,” Barrett continued.  “I have concerns with respect to municipal emergency planning in a county that is dissected by this boundary- a boundary where one would hope that Norfolk would have been within the same single network.”
Barrett also raised concerns that the regional bureaucracies will favour large urban centres over small communities.

“I think of West Haldimand General Hospital. Will it be overshadowed by the very major hospitals in Hamilton?” Barrett asked the Legislature.  “Can he (the Minister of Health) be sure that the new health care bureaucracy does not divert funding away from smaller hospitals in favour of the larger ones?”

If passed, bill 36 will carve Ontario into fourteen large jurisdictions, creating a new layer of bureaucracy between the Ontario government and health care delivery partners.

“Part of Norfolk is in LHIN number two, which stretches from the tip of Long Point to Tobermory,” Barrett concluded.  “That’s over four hundred kilometers and six and a half hours driving.”

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For more information, please contact MPP Toby Barrett at: (519) 428-0446, (416) 325-8404, or 1-800-903-8629