Alberta Premier Ralph Klein announced long-awaited proposals to reform his province's health care system Wednesday, including the possibility of charging user fees under certain conditions and higher premiums.
But he backed off on actually introducing a reform that would have set up two private pilot projects for private orthopedic clinics — a move that would violate the Canada Health Act -- because of huge public backlash in recent weeks and because his caucus voted against it.
The Tory Premier has been in hot water about his health reforms since the election campaign, during which he discussed the possibility of not respecting the Canada Health Act in his health strategy, to be announced June 30, just two days after the election.
Some felt that Mr. Klein's discussion of such a controversial topic hurt Stephen Harper's federal campaign, in which his party fell far short of the minority government it had at one time predicted. Liberal Leader Paul Martin was able to capitalize on Mr. Klein's comments and win 135 seats in Monday's election, to the Tories' 99.
Mr. Klein said Wednesday that he was shocked that the Tories' disappointing finish would be linked to him.
"I was astounded that [the newspapers] would accuse me single-handedly of ruining the Conservatives' chance at forming a majority government."
The discussion paper released Wednesday also suggests charging Albertans an income-based deductible for medical services and cutting the annual growth in health spending in half.
But the Premier emphasized that it was just a discussion paper.
"I have to remind you that this is only the first step in a health renewal strategy that will continue with a public consultation this fall and substantive reforms to be implemented over the next several years," Mr. Klein said at a press conference in Calgary.
He said he didn't know whether the consultations would be over before an anticipated fall provincial election. But he was also coy about whether he would hold one. "Perhaps. Perhaps not."
But he said that growing health care costs are becoming too large for the province to manage.
"Even a province as prosperous as Alberta can't continually add money to the system without taking it from somewhere else that needs it. So the bottom line is that we still need substantive reform," Mr. Klein said, adding that most important is knowing where the federal government stands.
"Now that the election is over, it's time for the Ottawa Liberals to come forward and show Canadians the plan — their plan."
Mr. Klein also got in a few jabs at Mr. Martin, saying that the Liberal Leader portrayed himself as the saviour of health care during the campaign. Now now Mr. Klein wants to see some results.
Provinces are increasingly bearing the burden of the cost of health care, Mr. Klein said.
Mr. Martin is set to meet with the premiers to hammer out a plan on health funding this summer. He couldn't say what Alberta government would do if it did decide to bring in private clinics which would violate the Canada Health Act and then Ottawa decided to try to stop the province from doing so.
He said that in that case, the federal government would likely cut off funding, but that the Alberta government would have to weigh whether that would matter.
"Considering now that the federal government pays so little toward the maintenance of health care across the country, we will have to assess, you know, whether the loss is greater than the gains we might make."
Mr. Klein's Health Minister, Gary Mar, also outlined the details of the province's $700-million health renewal strategy, which includes increasing the number of orthopedic surgeries, reducing wait times for heart surgeries, funding for rural facilities and adding 600 new hospital beds to Calgary and surrounding regions.
The Canada Health Act commits the federal government to a universal, accessible, comprehensive, portable and publicly administered health insurance system. It also sets out conditions the provinces must satisfy to get their full share of federal health-care funding.
Although Wednesday's date for rolling out Alberta's health reforms was set before the federal election was called in May, Mr. Martin made it an election issue in the last weeks of the campaign. He warned voters that Mr. Klein and Mr. Harper were secretly conspiring to unravel medicare should the Conservatives triumph.
Faced with a mounting political storm, Mr. Klein issued a news release last week extolling the public system and accusing the federal Liberals of underfunding it. However, the damage was done, and fear of Mr. Harper's health-care agenda appeared to be one factor in his party's poor showing in Ontario.
Mr. Klein has a long history of attacking, retreating and then attacking again on health-care reform.
Only weeks after becoming premier 11 years ago he called on Ottawa to allow provinces to charge health-care user fees.
Since then he has pleaded, threatened and cajoled four different prime ministers in his quest to loosen the Canada Health Act to make medicare more financially sustainable — and to squeeze more money out of the federal government.
His efforts at radical reforms have not borne fruit.
Alberta's experiment in 1994 of allowing private clinics to charge user fees ended with Ottawa fining the province $3.6-million. Mr. Klein dropped the fees.
In April 1998, Alberta introduced a bill to approve and regulate private-for-profit hospitals. The province withdrew the legislation after pressure from the public and Ottawa. Two years later, a less radical version of the law passed.
Still pushing the envelope, Alberta tabled a report in 2002 that said people should pay more for medical care in a system that gives a greater role to the private sector.
The government promised “this report won't sit on a shelf,” but hasn't acted on its recommendations more than two years later.
With reports from Canadian Press
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