Calls for action on health-care promises dominate first day of N.S. legislature's spring session

Nova Scotia's opposition party leaders are accusing the government of playing politics when it comes to incentives for doctors.

But the health minister says work continues to find the best way to recruit and retain physicians across the province.

The opening day of the spring session at Province House on Tuesday saw both the Liberals and NDP highlighting campaign promises by the Tories that have yet to be fulfilled, including reducing surgery backlogs and the waiting times for some procedures.

The Liberals and NDP also drew attention to a 2021 decision by the government to end a retention incentive for doctors working in the urban areas of the central zone.

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill called on the government to reinstate the measure.

He said to not do so runs counter to the pledge Premier Tim Houston has made multiple times to spend whatever it takes to fix health care.

"It's absolutely hypocritical," Churchill told reporters at Province House.

The Liberals plan to table legislation this week related to financial incentives for doctors.

Favouring rural ridings, says Churchill

Churchill accused the government of managing the health-care system in a partisan way, beginning with the decision to install a political ally of the premier as interim CEO of Nova Scotia Health and fire the health authority's board.

"The Conservatives don't have as many seats in Halifax as they do in rural Nova Scotia and this is a problem, I think, we have with the management of our health-care system."

NDP Leader Claudia Chender said Houston will spend whatever it takes to fix health care "in the ridings that are held by the Progressive Conservative government."

But Health Minister Michelle Thompson said politics had nothing to do with removing the incentive.

"That's not the case at all," she said Tuesday.

"Health care is an issue for all of us across this province. I'm a registered nurse. Health care should be equitable and we're working very hard to do that."

Follows recommendation

Thompson said the decision was informed by data and followed a recommendation from the Office of Healthcare Professionals Recruitment, a body the Tories established upon coming to power in 2021.

The minister said the suggestion came from then-CEO of the office, Dr. Kevin Orrell, because he was concerned too much of the money set aside for physician incentives was being consumed by doctors in the Halifax Regional Municipality and, in particular, the urban core.

Orrell has since left his post to take a job at Cape Breton University where he is an advisor working on establishing a second medical school in the province.

A spokesperson for the Health Department said Tuesday that financial and educational incentives for doctors were only offered outside the central zone before 2018.

After that changed, about 60 per cent of incentives were going to doctors in the central zone's urban areas by 2021, Khalehla Perrault said in an email.

Attracting doctors outside the central zone

Perrault said that was affecting the incentives to attract doctors to other parts of the province.

She said the bonuses continue to go to rural parts of the central zone, along with the rest of the province. Perrault said that previously there were three different incentives, including debt assistance of $45,000, a family medicine bursary of $60,000 and tuition relief, which was up to $120,000.

Both opposition parties pointed to the fact that the metro Halifax area is growing at a rapid rate and accounts for a large increases in the number of people joining the need-a-family-practice registry.

In recent weeks, two clinics in the metro Halifax area announced that their doctors would be shutting down their practices.

Burnout and a lack of additional resources were cited for the closures affecting about 8,000 patients.

Houston told reporters that he reached out to the doctors as soon as he heard the news.

Discussions ongoing

The premier said his message was that there would be support for the doctors if they wanted to return to family practice, but he has yet to receive a response.

The premier said the government would do what it takes to provide help to doctors but that help needs to come with a pledge from doctors to provide care for more people.

"We try to come up with the best solution at the right time. It's not always perfect, but we're trying to move in the right direction where we're incentivizing health-care professionals to come here and rewarding those that are here, as we've seen yesterday," he said, referring to Monday's announcement of hundreds of millions of dollars in retention bonuses for nurses and other health-care professionals.

Thompson said the government is in contract talks with Doctors Nova Scotia, the organization that represents physicians in the province, and incentives are being discussed.

"It's not a one and done. There's lots of things that we can offer."

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