Skip to main content

Hudak PCs health care funding promises worse than Mike Harris

Tim Hudak's Progressive Conservatives are promising to increase health care funding at a rate much slower than  the (infamous) Mike Harris Progressive Conservative government of the 1990s.  

According to the 2002 Budget, the Harris government ended up spending $20.659 billion in 1999-2000.  That would mean the four year, first term increase was $3.052 billion, or 17.33%.  The annual average was therefore 4.07%, almost a full percent above the 3.1% Mr. Hudak is promising. 

Harris' increases came despite the fact that inflation was lower during the first Harris years than it currently is in Ontario.  According to the 2000 Budget (page 7) the CPI rose 1.5.% in 1996, 1.9% in 1997, 0.9%in 1998, and 1.9% in 1999, for an average of 1.55%.  RBC predicted in March that inflation would run to 3.0% in Ontario in 2011 and 2.1% in 2012 (TD also made a similar prediction in March: 3.1% in 2011 and 2.0% in 2012).   Ontario inflation is currently running at 3.6% annually (April 2011 report).
  
The first term  of Harris’ reign was a disaster for hospital patients, with ambulances bouncing from hospital to hospital to try to find one with an Emergency Room that could possibly take another patient.  Hudak looks much the same, judged from the money angle (while pretending otherwise).   


Another similarity: Harris tried to justify the attack on hospitals by claiming that the government was doing more for long term care and home care.  Hudak has made promises for those sub-sectors, but has made no promises in his policy book to improve hospitals.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

More spending on new hospitals and new beds? Nope

Hospital funding:  There is something off about the provincial government's Budget claims on hospital capital funding (funding to build and renovate hospital beds and facilities).    For what it is worth (which is not that much, given the long time frame the government cites), the province claims it will increase hospital capital spending over the next 10 years from $11 billion to $20 billion – or on average to about $2 billion per year.   But, this is just a notional increase from the previous announcement of future hospital capital spending.  Moreover, even if we did take this as a serious promise and not just a wisp of smoke, the government's own reports shows they have actually funded hospital infrastructure about $3 billion a year over the 2011/12-2015/16 period. So this “increase” is really a decrease from past actual spending. Even last year's (2016-17) hospital capital funding increase was reported in this Budget at $2.3 billion - i.e. about 15% more th

Ford government fails to respond to 72% increase in COVID inpatient days, deepening the capacity crisis

COVID infections continue to drive up hospital costs and inpatient hospitalizations in Ontario. For the most recent fiscal year (April 1, 2022- March 31, 2023) hospital stays related to COVID cost $1.221 billion, according to new CIHI data.   This is about 4% of total hospital spending, creating a very significant new cost pressure beyond the usual pressures of population growth, aging, inflation, and rising utilization.   Costs for COVID related hospitalizations increased 22.2% in Ontario in 2022/23 from the previous fiscal year, rising from $999 million to $1.221 billion.  That rise is particularly notable as the OMICRON spike of late 2021 and early 2022 had passed by the the 2022/23 fiscal year.   The $222 million increase in COVID hospitalization costs came in the same year as the Ford government cut special COVID funding and, in fact, cut total hospital funding by $156 million.     In total, there were 60,653 COVID hospitalizations in Ontario in 2022/3, up from 47,543 in 2021/2. 

Paramedic Services in Canada: Structure, Privatization, Unionization and other issues

Governance and Funding :  While police and fire services are usually municipal services, Emergency Medical Services (EMS) are typically controlled by provincial governments.  In Ontario, regional municipal governments have responsibility for delivering and funding EMS.  But even in Ontario the province plays a key role, strictly regulating EMS, providing funding for 50% of the approved land ambulance costs, and paying 100% of the approved costs for air ambulance, dispatch, base hospitals, First Nation EMS, and for territories without municipal government. Delivery :  Like police and fire services, EMS is predominantly a publicly provided service in Canada.   But businesses have now made some significant in-roads into EMS, primarily  Medavie,  a private corporation based in the Maritimes that describes itself as not-for-profit.  Medavie goes back over 70 years, with its roots in health insurance.  It still operates Medavie Blue Cross with 1,900 employees.  It now a