Bill 17, Alberta Health Act

November 24, 2010

Mrs. Forsyth: Well, Mr. Chair, thank you very much. I listened intently to the former minister of health from Sherwood Park, a nurse, actually. It’s interesting to hear her speak up and eloquently speak in regard to the position statement on emergency department overcrowding that was published by the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians, dated February 2007.

I guess my question to the minister at that time, if she’s so passionate about these protocols, is: why didn’t she bring them in when she was the minister of health? Then we probably wouldn’t be where we were today. I can’t even remember when she was minister of health, but to passionately speak about the protocols and not talk about legislation: if the protocols had been put in place when she was the minister of health, we wouldn’t be sitting here talking about legislation five or six years later. [interjection] The Member for Edmonton-Whitemud is obviously going to get up and speak about this because he’s trying to carry on some conversations with me also. It’s the same minister who doesn’t have the hospital in the constituency, so it just shows, you know, where we’re going with the government.

Mr. Chair, I’m pleased, again, to be speaking to this important amendment, put forward by my colleague from Edmonton- Meadowlark. He’s someone whose opinion I value because of the experience in emergency room medicine. Not only was he a doctor; he was the AMA section chief for emergency medicine. Clearly, he’s a leader in the field. He’s so well thought of that the minister of health this morning or last night indicated that he had the utmost respect for the member. He spoke about his passion. He spoke about numerous other things that the member has done and how he respected him – I’ve got notes all over the place – but still they managed to boot the poor guy out. I’ve never seen anything like that as long as I’ve been an MLA.

My colleagues and I have spent the last day in this Chamber – a day or two days? It’s been a long time, anyhow, listening to the members of the government repeatedly, on one hand, praise the member and, on the other hand, dispute any of these ideas that he’s clearly put forward. The hon. health minister, as I indicated, described the Member for Edmonton-Meadowlark as his guiding light, and then he went on to dispute and second-guess everything that he has put forward.

Now, his amendments call for a legislated wait time in emergency rooms, and we’ve all heard from the government how bad the idea is. They tell us how it can’t be done. They tell us how it doesn’t work. The health minister has repeatedly said in the House over the last 24 hours how wait times don’t belong in law. He goes on at length about how important wait time limits are, but he refuses to give them an anchor in legislation. He likes to say how wait time limits belong in performance measures.

Given how often and how badly this government misses its performance measures or changes them to claim political victories, how can anyone, seriously, any Albertan, believe this government will meet guidelines on their own without a law to enforce it? The bottom line is that the government won’t legislate wait times because they know they have no plan to actually meet them. A performance measure can be missed or it can be changed with no repercussions, but this government continues to be allergic to accountability, and we’ve seen that over and over and over again.

Mr. Chair, the Member for Edmonton-Castle Downs was trying to discredit other jurisdictions who have legislated wait time limits. He says that time limits that are enshrined into law are like putting a gun to the heads of doctors, but there are countries that have succeeded where this government continues to fail when it comes to legislating wait times in health care delivery. In Norway the patients’ bill of rights guarantees that you see a specialist within 30 days of referral. The legislated time limit has been in place since 1999, and quite frankly it’s still working. It works because the system is accountable to patients. If the system can’t meet the obliged time limit, patients are treated in nearby Scandinavian countries at no cost to them. This example illustrates how accountability measures and practical solutions that are entrenched in law force government and, quite frankly, force the bureaucrats to adapt and respond to the needs of patients.

The minister also talked about court time and how he wants people to get into the health system and that he doesn’t want them to be tied up in court time. I found that comment very interesting, actually, coming from the minister. Quite frankly, you can learn from what other people have done and what other mistakes have been made. He has a huge, huge department, and he can find out what they were doing right and what they were doing wrong. It’s a good way to learn where others have made mistakes or why they were not able make the legislated wait times. The government is continuing, again, to show a stunning lack of political courage in making themselves accountable.

I’d also like to talk about Scotland, a jurisdiction that is similar in size and system to Alberta, that is moving forward on legislated wait times. It’s single payer. It’s universal. It’s a publicly funded system, just like ours. They have a superboard; we have a superboard. They have an aging population; we have an aging population. They have pharmaceutical drug growth; we have pharmaceutical drug growth. They have a shortage of family doctors; we have a shortage of family doctors. But they’re moving ahead while this government keeps dragging its heels and refuses to show leadership.

We have a lot to learn from social demographics in Europe and elsewhere. We aren’t the only ones trying to find solutions, but we seem to be the only ones who lack the courage to make the decisions that professionals like the Member for Edmonton-Meadowlark are asking for. It’s our front-line medical staff like doctors, nurses, nurse practitioners, LPNs, nursing assistants who intimately understand the complexities of our health care system. They know the reforms, they know the answers, they like the legislated wait times, and they know that that will at least improve one area of the system.

We’ve heard a lot of criticism from the minister in regard to the repercussions and that if we legislate wait times for emergency, why aren’t we legislating wait times for cancer care, for access to kidney care, for brain cancer, for lung cancer? The list goes on. Well, Mr. Chair, they’re all connected. Quite frankly, if you’re someone that is unfortunate enough to have cancer, whether it’s kidney cancer, brain cancer, lung cancer, any kind of cancer, if you have eye problems, if you have knee problems, your first point of entry when you’re not feeling well is emergency. If you can’t get into emergency when you’re feeling sick or you need to have some care because you’re throwing up from the chemotherapy, you can’t even possibly think of getting well.

The health professionals who work in the trenches, as I indicated, know the answers. They only need to be asked. While the government indicates health care professionals can speak out and indicates that the code of conduct, better known as the code, doesn’t stop them, the message in the trenches is, quite frankly, much different, and they’re scared of coming forward.

I can tell you as the health critic and as a member of the Wildrose– and I’ve mentioned this in my speaking – that I don’t know how many meetings we’ve had in quiet places where no one can see the health care professionals that we meet with. I know the hon. Member for Calgary-Glenmore, who is just as interested in the health debate as I am and is interested in health – I can’t even tell you how many meetings we’ve had. We’ve met in places that we didn’t even know existed in Calgary, meeting with some docs and some emergency docs, a lot of doctors and a lot of health care professionals that want to talk.

Mr. Chair, let’s be honest here. Quite frankly, we wouldn’t be having this debate at all if the government had been doing their job in the first place. It’s amazing to me that the Member for Sherwood Park can stand up and literally read from a doctor’s oath, I think it was, and can read from the physicians, and she is a former health minister. She’s talking about all these protocols that we can put in place, and she had the opportunity to when she was the minister of health, as did the Minister of Energy when he was minister of health, as did the Minister of Education. We’re now on a new health minister, so that’s four health ministers, that I can recall, that all had the opportunity to put this protocol in place, which they haven’t put in place. That’s exactly why we’re spending hours and hours debating this particular issue.

This emergency issue is not a new issue. It’s an old issue. It was brought to the forefront by the Member for Edmonton-Meadowlark when he was an emergency physician. It was brought to, I’m sure, both ministers’ attention, that being the Minister of Energy when he was minister of health and now the current minister of health, when they were ministers, about what was happening in the system. Then it was rebrought up by Dr. Parks after he had sent an e-mail to the Minister of Energy, who was then the minister of health, telling him about the emergency.

The letter that we happened to get and leak out was from Dr. Duckett indicating that health care was in a crisis at that particular time. He indicated right in that letter that one of the reasons that they were dealing with this situation, which I found absolutely appalling, was public pressure. If that public pressure hadn’t been there and if the courageous doctor from emergency, Dr. Parks, and our doctor here hadn’t brought this again to the forefront, I’m not even sure if we would be talking about the amendment that’s before us at this particular time.

The amendment, quite frankly, Mr. Chair, that the Member for Edmonton-Meadowlark is proposing is what I think goes to the heart of the system, truly goes to the heart of the health care system. The other thing it goes to is the heart of accountability, and that’s accountability in the health care system. We have decided as our caucus and, I know, probably as the Liberal caucus and the ND caucus and our independent members – and we have quite eloquently heard from one of the government members, the Member for St. Albert, about how they support this particular amendment. I think that’s very brave on behalf of the Member for St. Albert.

I sat here for hours along with my colleagues waiting for some of the other government members to come up and speak out about the fact that they believe that this is the right amendment. They have to, have to, have to be hearing from their constituents. Mr. Chair, we’re inundated with phone calls, e-mails. I was on the phone till 1:30 last night talking to doctors, telling them that we’re into a late night, and my caucus was kind enough to let me go home and grab a few hours of sleep. When they were e-mailing me, I said to them by e-mail that, oh, it was late, and they insisted that I call them anyhow. When I did call them, talking to them till 1:30 in the morning, I was saying well, don’t you find this late? It is a normal procedure for them to be up at 1:30 in the morning and doing their emergency care, et cetera.

We could go on and on, Mr. Chair, about this amendment, but I can tell you, in all honesty, that why I believe this amendment is the right thing is twofold. The first reason, quite frankly, is what we’re hearing from the emergency physician from Edmonton-Meadowlark and what we’re hearing from other health care providers in the system, that they believe in that. That goes to the emergency doctors, in fact all doctors and, quite frankly, all health care professionals.

I think that more important, though – and this goes to the heart of the situation – is what we’re hearing from our constituents and what we’re hearing from Albertans about the importance of the amendment that the Member for Edmonton-Meadowlark has brought forward. We’ve spent hours and hours of debate on this. I would hope that the government members will speak up on this particular amendment, whether they support it or not, and if they support it, as the Member for St. Albert explained why he supports it. I have the utmost respect for members to get up and speak about why they don’t support the amendment because, ultimately, the buck stops with them, and the voters in their constituencies are the bosses, as the Member for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo likes to say.

We have continually debated this one amendment, and we will continue to debate this amendment. We’ve all obviously said that we’re prepared to go for all hours at night to discuss this. I’m pleased once again to stand up and support the amendment that Edmonton-Meadowlark has brought forward. In fact, I’m proud to be able to stand up and support this particular amendment. I’m proud to stand up on behalf of the unbelievably dedicated, compassionate health care professionals, and that’s all health care professionals. That goes down to the janitors and every other single person that works in this health care system that tries to make this health care system run smoothly no matter what job they take on. They’re all important.

I’m more proud, actually, Mr. Chair, to speak on behalf of the constituents of Calgary-Fish Creek as the health critic for the Wildrose Alliance, to speak on behalf of the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of e-mails, Twitters, letters, phone calls that we have received on behalf of Albertans.

Thank you.