The government is said to be ill-suited to operate the board but they are the ones who appoint those who operate it and they are the ones who fund it. Also, the board is not meant to be a profit making entity but the business people are all oriented towards that. This is a great step backward in health care. Where is the representation of patients and providers who are also stakeholders in the healthcare system? Where are the communities that pay the taxes to fund the system. This is an outrage upon the citizens of Alberta. They should try to stop this system as best they can. The business people appointed by the governments are the least well suited to operate the board. They are concerned for profit not providing the best health care. Some business people on the board would be helpful since they perhaps could advise on efficiency aspects of the operation but to run it is entirely different.
Saturday » May 17 » 2008
Liepert prescribes private health vision
Minister says entity will operate like multibillion-dollar corporation
Archie McLean
The Edmonton Journal
Saturday, May 17, 2008
EDMONTON - Alberta's new health-care superboard will operate like a multi-billion dollar private outfit, a job government is ill-suited to do, Health Minister Ron Liepert said Friday.
Speaking with reporters in Calgary, Liepert was careful not to use the word corporation, but said the board will lean heavily on people with experience in private-sector boardrooms.
"I don't think government does a good job of running a $13-billion operation," he said.
"What we need is a board with people who have governance, private-sector business experience, running it like a $13-billion operation.
"And I don't view myself as an MLA as being a member of the board of directors. I view myself as a shareholder in this operation.
"And as an investor, as a shareholder in this operation, I want the best return on my investment."
Liepert said the new board will look more like the province's new investment management board, which is laden with business heavyweights, rather than the more community-oriented health authorities.
He said the new board will be given an "envelope" of cash to fund the health-care system for the entire province, and suggested it will have to stay within that budget.
Liepert's rhetoric worried groups opposed to private health care.
Friends of Medicare executive director Suzanne Marshall said the language is similar to the government's 2001 healthcare report, written by former Deputy Prime Minister Don Mazankowski.
Marshal questioned the makeup of the six-person interim board, which includes a number of business leaders.
"Our question is, where are the health policy experts?" Marshall said. "We're all for corporate success, but health care is a not-for-profit business."
Jean Graham, the former board chairman of David Thompson Health Region, told the Red Deer Advocate on Thursday she has similar feelings.
"I'm very concerned that a seven-person interim board, with probably good management skills but not much health knowledge, will be able to govern the system as effectively as a local governing body."
NDP critic Rachel Notley said the government is perfectly capable of running a multi-billion dollar health-care operation.
But Liepert dismissed critics as "status quoers," married to an old way of thinking.
"The usual suspects come up with the same old status quo, don't want change. You know, I think Albertans said on March the third, we want change.
"We're sick and tired of not being prepared to act on ensuring that we've got a health-care system in the future that we can be proud of."
On Thursday, Liepert took a first step towards reforming Alberta's health-care system by eliminating the province's nine health regions and forming a single "superboard."
The idea, said the board's interim chairman, Ken Hughes, is to create a single entity that moves beyond regional rival-ries.
"We're evolving from a phase where there's an expectation of advocacy for your own regional interests, to a new phase where we are actually creating an entity where the duty is to every single Albertan," said Hughes.
"While I may live in Springbank, I don't speak for Springbank. My duty is to every Albertan."
Hughes, the president of an insurance brokerage firm, said he took the job out of a sense of duty and as a challenge.
"I'm a person who will respond to a request to serve the public interest," he said.
"This is the single most important public policy issue in the country today. How do you deliver health-care services within the framework of the provincial systems, in the framework of the Canada Health Act, within the framework of publicly funded health care?"
Hughes wouldn't speculate on the changes that will be coming in the weeks and months ahead.
amclean@thejournal.canwest.com
© The Edmonton Journal 2008
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