Wall’s partisan appointments are unhealthy

There is simply no area of government as diverse as health care.

Not the Ministry of the Economy. Not Highways. Not Social Services. Not even Education must stretch from corner to corner to corner to corner of Saskatchewan in the way that Health must.

From birth to death, the health-care system impacts everyone every day, regardless of sex, age, race, creed and colour.

Our public health system is every time anyone enters a clinic, doctor’s office or hospital for a test, emergency, surgery or just a visit. It’s every day someone lives in a nursing home or every day they don’t because we have home care. It’s every time anyone has ever gone to a pharmacy to fill a prescription. It’s tens of thousands of well-trained, well-educated professionals. And really, that’s just scratching the surface.

In fact, perhaps the only thing more mindboggling than trying to simply grasp what our $5.558-billion-a-year provincial health system does is the notion that anyone would have the audacity to oversee it. Certainly, $25,000 a year for board members ($40,000 a year for a board chair) would never attract the talent required to oversee things.

That said, if any place on earth could attract people who believe in and are committed to the excellence of independent public care, one might think it would be Saskatchewan, where public care was born.

And we do happen to be blessed with a vast array of professors, health system analysts, former officers from the Saskatchewan Medical Association and myriad health-care unions who have dedicated their lives to public health delivery.

So what exactly was the Saskatchewan Party thinking when it decided to salt its new 10-person provincewide health authority board with as many partisans as it thought it could get away with? Really, what does Premier Brad Wall’s government expect to accomplish, other than the destruction of the board’s credibility before it gets a chance to do anything?

We no longer have other regional boards to advocate for local health concerns. Nor do we have a specific health ombudsman, even though the Sask. Party vowed it would appoint one.

So where do we now go for arm’s-length independence from government politicians and the Health ministry?

Maybe we need not be where we were a quarter-century ago in 1992 when Saskatchewan had more than 500 health-related boards overseeing 134 hospitals, 132 acute and long-term care facilities and 105 ambulance services.

But what can we expect from Health Minister Jim Reiter’s appointments, which include six members who are Sask. Party donors?

As pointed out by the NDP, Reiter’s board consists of: “a former chief of staff to a Sask. Party finance minister; a campaign manager to another Sask. Party minister; someone who has voiced extreme and intolerant positions on their social media feeds; and someone who brags that he has ‘provided advice on virtually all of the major privatizations that have occurred in Saskatchewan during the past 30 years.’”

In fairness, the NDP glosses over solid appointments such as Dr. Janet Tootoosis of North Battleford. Also, a successful lawyer like Regina’s Robert Pletch — whether partisan or not — is a highly competent individual. In fact, having legal, accounting or business backgrounds might have helped achieve that needed balance.

Finally, no governing party was historically worse for appointing unqualified partisans to boards than the Saskatchewan NDP.

But c’mon. Are we a supposed take seriously any notion of arm’s-length objectivity from a provincewide health board that has virtually no health professionals other than Tootoosis, is dominated by six known partisans and is chaired by former government-appointed operative

Dick Carter? There was no one else in the province?

Does the Sask. Party truly think people are so stupid that they would buy into their “checklist” nonsense that this has been a successful board appointment process because it has gender parity and rural, aboriginal, Regina, Saskatoon and business representation?

Do old-style partisan appointments now qualify as “transformational change?”

They are not health experts. They are not health advocates. They are largely partisans and that does not help.