ONTARIO ELECTION 2007 - What Ontario's political parties are saying about the Second Stage of Medicare
In August 2007, AOHC issued a 20-point "call to action" to Ontario's political parties. Building the Second Stage of Medicare: A Call to Action for Ontario's Political Parties contains 20 priority action steps that the AOHC believes must be taken to improve health and health care in Ontario.
Here are the parties' detailed responses. Below, a brief comparative analysis is provided.
Ontario Liberal Party -- Ontario PC Party -- Ontario NDP -- Ontario Green Party
AOHC BRIEF ANALYSIS OF PARTY RESPONSES
Green Party fully commits to Second Stage of Medicare action plan; Clearer answers needed from other major parties
The good news: The Ontario Green Party has committed to all 20 action steps that AOHC identified in the action plan to speed up completion of the Second Stage of Medicare.
The bad news: In general, the answers received from other major parties were much less clear. So during the next few weeks of the election campaign we need Ontarians who believe in the benefits of our action plan to question politicians from these parties much more closely.
When candidates come to your door, appear on election call-in shows, or attend all-candidates meetings, ask them for clearer answers.
Liberals and NDP to improve dental care
Except for the Green Party (which said “yes” to all 20 action steps), only one action step - concerning dental care -secured significant commitments from other major parties. AOHC called for publicly-funded dental coverage for all Ontarians not covered by private dental insurance, and publicly-funded oral health care to be provided at all of the province’s CHCs and AHACs. Liberals and NDP both stopped short of publicly funded coverage for all Ontarians. But both parties did commit to funding dental care, with NDP committing to dental care in CHCs.
Who said what on four key issues?
To our other questions AOHC received very general replies from the Liberal, NDP and Progressive Conservative Parties - or no answer at all. Here’s a list of who said what on four of AOHC's key calls to action.
1. To ensure that every Ontarian who needs access to CHCs and AHACs can secure it, complete a network throughout the province.
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The Green Party said “yes” and committed to completing a provincial network, beginning with the establishment of 20 new CHCs and AHACs per year for the next four years;
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The New Democratic Party did use the word “increase” with respect to the number of Community Health Centres and AHACs, but offered no further details. Their reply said: “Community Health Centres and Aboriginal Health Access Centres have a proven track record of providing excellent health care, health promotion and community development in a very cost-effective manner. That’s why our party supports increasing the number of CHCs and AHACS to provide better health care access across the province.”
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The Liberal Party said that when the recent expansion of CHCs they initiated in their first mandate is complete they will, “in partnerships with the LHINs review to see if there are areas of additional need across the province.”
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Despite our specific question about CHCs and AHACs, the letter we received from the Progressive Conservative Party made no mention of either kind of Centre. We also looked in PC party platform and found no mention there either.
2. Improve health care for Aboriginal populations, and eliminate the second class status of Aboriginal Health Access Centres (AHACs) by providing $14.6 million in new annualized funding to Ontario’s ten AHACs.
- The Green Party answered with a simple “yes”.
- As noted above, AHACs received no mention in the letter we received from the Progressive Conservative Party.
- The Liberal Party noted that in their first term they allocated $1 million to ensure that AHAC physicians and nurse practitioners are treated equitably. To make further progress, they said “we will review the funding of AHACs.”
- The NDP said “any approach to population health should address these disparities” but offered no specific detail.
3. Improve health care for newly-arrived immigrants by eliminating the 3-month wait period for OHIP that is currently imposed:
- The Green Party answered with another simple “yes”.
- The Liberal Party said: “Since coming to office, we have taken some steps to rethink this policy as seen in our commitment to waive the waiting period for military families. We will review this policy during our second term.”
- The NDP offered no answer to our question.
- The Progressive Conservative Party also offered no answer to our question.
4. To improve Ontarians' access to health care, remove barriers that prevent Nurse Practitioners from practicing what they are trained and licensed to do.
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Again, the Green Party answered by saying “yes” and agreed to implement the recommendations of the Nurse Practitioner Taskforce.
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The Liberal Party said they are waiting for recommendations from the Health Professions Regulatory Advisory Committee.
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In their party platform, the Progressive Conservative Party say they will allow health practitioners to practice to full scope of practice but in their letter to us the party made no mention of how this would be applied to Nurse Practitioners.
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NDP say they “support expanded roles and fair compensation for health professionals like Nurse Practitioners” but offered no further detail.
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