Dosanjh's health plan

By Dan Hilborn
Published May 25, 2005


A federal election will likely be held this year, and nowhere is that more evident than in the ranks of the Liberal Party of Canada, which is working hard to keep its minority government intact until after Justice John Gomery finishes his commission of inquiry into the federal sponsorship scandal.

Recently, with the assistance of former Burnaby-Douglas Liberal candidate Bill Cunningham, who now serves as senior advisor and executive director of the federal government's ministerial regional office in Vancouver, the Burnaby NOW was able to obtain a 20-minute interview with one of the key figures in Ottawa - B.C.'s former NDP premier Ujjal Dosanjh, who now serves as the minister of health for the nation.

The interview, which focused on the issues facing the health-care system in Canada, was conducted prior to the attempt from the Conservatives to topple the minority government with a non-confidence motion against the government.

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Ujjal Dosanjh knows that many Canadians are worried about the future of their health-care system, but the new Minister of Health in the beleaguered Paul Martin government is confident that the country is on the right track.

And while Dosanjh acknowledges that longer wait lists have become "the symbol of our problems," he also said that recent surveys have found that people who use the health-care system have a higher degree of confidence in the care they receive than those who don't use the system.

"There are problems, but the system is sound," Dosanjh said. "Over 73 per cent of people in contact with the health-care system believe the system functions well. Those not in contact are generally more apprehensive. They hear the anecdotes of what didn't work. In fact, it's rare when emergency issues are not dealt with early."

Fairly or otherwise, Dosanjh believes that most Canadians are judging the health-care system on wait times and, in that vein, his government is pledging to take several steps to reduce the time it takes to receive required surgeries in five key areas - cardiac care, cancer, eyesight, joint replacement and diagnostics testing such as MRIs.

Then, under the proposed revisions to the federal budget, the Liberals plan to give an extra $41 billion to the provinces over the next 10 years, including $5.5 billion specifically targeted to reduce wait times.

By the end of this year, the government and its Wait Times Alliance hopes to set benchmarks for appropriate waiting times for the above-noted surgeries, and then achieve "significant progress" on reaching those goals by March 31, 2007.

Helping to reach those objectives will be additional expenditures on equipment, developing a better home-care system, a national pharmaceutical strategy and the integration of more foreign doctors into Canada.

Another issue in health care is the interpretation of the Canada Health Act and the ability of the government to uphold the five principles of health care that are enshrined in the document - public administration, comprehensiveness, universality, portability and accessibility.

"There are only two prohibitions in the act," Dosanjh said. "One is against user fees for physician or doctor services and the other is against using your own money to jump the queue.

"There are those who believe that privatizing delivery or allowing people to use their own money will cure the ailment in our health-care system. But Romanow found there is no evidence that private health care is any less expensive or more efficient." (Ray Romanow is a former NDP premier of Manitoba who chaired the Commission on the Future of Health Care in Canada, which reported its findings to Parliament on Nov. 28, 2002.)

Dosanjh said there are two outstanding issues across the nation in regards to enforcing the Canada Health Act. The first is an issue with the province of New Brunswick over abortion funding, and the second is a dispute with B.C., Alberta, Quebec and Nova Scotia on the funding of private diagnostic or MRI clinics.

"I have said that I will enforce the Canada Health Act," Dosanjh said, noting that discussions began early this month at the deputy minister level to see how compliance can be reached.

Dosanjh also promised stricter regulations on the drug approval process. "We want to make sure we have active surveillance after a drug is marketed and strong standards beforehand," he said. "We want more transparency and we'll inject an aspect of public input to the approval process.

"It's going to be difficult," Dosanjh said of his proposed drug policy. "We want to bring in laws that provide conditional approval, not open approval. We want mandatory reporting on adverse reactions so that we can take action when they occur. In the past, the process was shrouded in secrecy. I operate on the principle that people have the right to know. If you have confidential information, you have to satisfy us why you want it kept confidential. In the past, it has been clear to us that some companies would not share all the information with us."

Finally, Dosanjh spoke of the sponsorship scandal and his unqualified support for Prime Minister Paul Martin.

"I am very pleased and satisfied with the prime minister's action," Dosanjh said. "He terminated Alfonso Gagliano and established the commission of inquiry and then he retained a lawyer to pursue the corporations responsible. Police are investigating and charges are pending and I think he's taking the right steps and it's only fair to allow Justice Gomery to complete his job.

"The prime minister has done the courageous thing. He could have left it to the RCMP," Dosanjh said. "Yes, we're suffering some collateral damage, but the prime minister is a man of integrity who wants to get to the bottom of this and he knows it will only strengthen us in the long run.

"Today, you have the NDP working with the federal Liberals to make the budget provide more programs than it had. There's more health care, more child care, the Atlantic Accord and it is a very progressive budget to which we have added the NDP's tuition reduction, more foreign aid, affordable housing and money for the environment.

"We were already doing work in those areas. Now, we'll be doing those things a little more aggressively."

And on the day this interview was conducted, Dosanjh was still projecting an air of confidence that the federal Liberals would be able to ride out the storm that was threatening to dissolve the 38th Parliament and continue governing, at least until the Gomery Commission had finished its work sometime later this fall.