Listen to Jim talk with Tayler Parnaby about the Banting Homestead on CFRB

Queen's Park Mar 07, 2006
Despite my best objections, on March 1, 2006, the McGuinty Liberals rammed Bill 36 through the Ontario Legislature, despite mounting opposition and many pleas for further consultation. 

Bill 36 has come to be better known as the LHIN (Local Health Integration Networks) legislation. What this legislation does is overhaul Ontario’s entire healthcare system by adding more bureaucracy, centralizing power and hastening the process of privatization.

Maybe this is what McGunity and Smitherman had envisioned all along, using your hard earned tax dollars that they raised through the illegal Liberal health tax to hire an army of overpriced bureaucrats and administrators to help make health care services in Ontario less accessible to the average user. And the Liberals won’t even attempt to deny this accusation. Even they estimate that Bill 36 will cost the province in excess of $160 million to administer the newly created LHINs, money that I think could have been better used to offer front line health services.

The Liberals claim that LHINs will decentralize the health care system and allow local administrators more local control, and for the Liberals this was the whole point of introducing the legislation in the first place. But a closer look tells you that this Bill will actually centralize power in the hands of the Minister as he has the power to appoint the LHIN board at his complete discretion. And what if the board makes a decision that he doesn’t agree with? No big deal, Bill 36 gives the Minister the power to override any decision that the board makes. I’m not sure how a Liberal appointed LHIN board, people who serve at the pleasure of the Minister, will serve the interest of local control?

This is exactly what the PC party, and our leader John Tory has been highlighting over the past few months, “this legislation gives the Health Minister the ability to unilaterally close hospitals, other healthcare services and transfer charitable gifts from one institution to another without any consultation,” states Tory.

Liberals claim they are dedicated to preserving public health care, but their actions indicate otherwise. Since the Liberals took office over two years ago they have privatized physiotherapy, chiropractic and optometry services. They are also moving forward with public-private partnerships with the building of new hospitals, something they so vigorously opposed while in opposition. I believe that Bill 36 will only aid the Liberals in their efforts to further privatize many of Ontario’s important health care services.

My position and the position of the PC Party, that LHINs will centralize power in the hands of the Minster and lead to further privatization, is shared by many others, including those who work in the field. These are the individuals and groups who the Liberals have callously disregarded as they moved this legislation forward. Bea Levis, member of the Ontario Health Coalition board says, “This legislation grants major new powers to Cabinet, the minister, and his appointees in the LHINs to order restructuring, amalgamations, closures and contracting out in the health system.”

Despite McGunity’s and Smitherman’s best efforts to confuse and mislead you into believing that LHINs will promote local control and improve the service that Ontarian’s receive from their health care providers, don’t be fooled. How can legislation that centralizes power and strengthens the Minister really be about local control? What I think should have happened is the Liberals should have listened to the objections of those who work in the health care profession and scraped this legislation a long time ago. I rejected similar proposals when I was the Minister of Health and that is exactly what Smitherman should have done too!

Listen to Jim talk about the Banting Homestead on CFRB's Tayler Parnaby Report
CFRB Chief Correspondent Tayler Parnaby recently interviewed Jim on the future of the Banting Homestead in Alliston. 

Click here to listen to Jim's interview on CFRB
 

jim.wilson@pc.ola.org