PRENTICE PLEDGES AHS BOARD
ALBERTA HEALTH HAS BEEN ‘OVER CENTRALIZED’
Tory leadership hopeful Jim Prentice says he would bring back an independent board of directors to oversee Alberta Health Services, just one year after the Progressive Conservative government turfed the directors and replaced them with a single administrator.
That’s in stark contrast to rival Thomas Lukaszuk, a former deputy premier, who says he would stick with the present governance structure because the health-care system can’t handle another major restructuring without diminishing the quality of patient care.
But Prentice, a former federal cabinet minister, told the Herald’s editorial board that the Alberta PC government has “over-centralized” the $18-billion health system.
“I think the pendulum has gone too far and I feel very strongly about that because of what I’m hearing from Albertans as I criss-cross the province,” he said Wednesday.
He said an agency that allocates a large chunk of the province’s budget should be governed by a board of directors who can represent all Albertans.
Over the past two decades, the Tory government first eliminated hospital boards in favour of 17 elected regional health authorities that were merged in 2008 into a single unelected superboard.
But the entire board of directors was fired by Health Minister Fred Horne in 2013 after a dramatic showdown with the government over paying out year-end bonuses to senior executives within the organization.
“I don’t agree with how the former board was treated,” Prentice said.
“To be very clear about this, we need a decent group of men and women who are capable, who will work together with the cabinet — the minister and the cabinet — to get the system rebalanced.”
Prentice said Albertans want a say in how health care is delivered in their communities and they don’t feel they have a voice any longer.
But Lukaszuk said the governance model is not the problem.
“The system has been restructured over and over so many times over the past few years that I would be frankly surprised if any front-line workers still know who their bosses are,” he said in an interview Thursday.
“The system simply cannot afford to be restructured yet again. We keep focusing on models of governance, but at the end of the day what Albertans want is the good delivery of services on the front lines and that’s where our attention should be.”
Lukaszuk said he would establish an advisory board comprising resi- dents from around the province to advise the health minister and AHS because medical needs and priorities vary from region to region, but he would not decentralize the power structure at this time.
Prentice said he would also engage the 13 health advisory councils, which currently report to AHS, having them instead report to the minister.
The AHS board used to hold public meetings across the province, something that has also ceased with the appointment of a single administrator last year.
“We need a good board. First and foremost, we need a respected group of Albertans who people have confidence in to head the system up,” Prentice said.
“I’d leave it to their judgment when the time comes as to whether — when and how — they want to conduct their meetings, including having public meetings.”
Ric McIver, a former Calgary alderman and provincial cabinet minister who is also running for the premier’s job in September, declined to state a position, saying he is still consulting.
“I’m consulting with my bosses, front-line workers and patients before I make a decision,” he said in an e-mail.
Wildrose health critic Heather Forsyth said Prentice appears to be hearing the same message Albertans have been telling her: they want a voice in the major decisions that affect health care.
Forsyth said Albertans have grown frustrated with the health minister’s meddling with a board that was supposed to be independent.
“Thank you Minister (Fred) Horne,” she said. “You have taken away all the local decision-making and put it under your government — and it’s not working.”
Liberal Leader Dr. Raj Sherman agreed with Lukaszuk that the last thing the health-care system needs now is another change in the constantly shifting management structure.
He, too, said the government must fix the pressing problems in the system first, such as wait lists and the lack of hospital beds.
But down the road, Sherman said he would also like to see a return to a more decentralized model of governance.
“We would return to a regional delivery model of care and have elected boards — not politically appointed friends,” he said.