The Medical Reform Group believes the voters of this province chose change on the basis of some very thoughtful analysis particularly of the situation of health services in our province. To disappoint them by returning to the Tory strategy is not only bad economics, but risks alienating the most important people in this province - the voters who have given you such an extraordinary mandate to do things differently and better than the government you replaced.

As your party noted during the election campaign, the so-called "saving" to the public purse by privatizing the finance, operation and ownership of hospitals is really a false economy. The world-wide evidence is clear. Public audit offices in Britain, PEI, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Australia and the government of Canada have all reported that P3 hospitals do not save money, they cost more. The off-book accounting that characterizes P3 schemes may hide the debt temporarily from public scrutiny but it does disappear for the next generation of Ontarians. This type of accounting has been entirely discredited by the Enron fiasco and needs to be rejected forthwith.

      Not only do P3 hospitals cost more -- the high costs associated with this model of redevelopment on the capital side are often accompanied by cuts in operating and clinical budgets, including, on average, 26 per cent staff cuts and 30 per cent bed cuts, according to a recent item in the British Medical Association Journal

     You will have already received a brief from a group of eminent Canadian economists including Lewis Auerbach, Arthur Donner, Douglas D. Peters, Monica Townson, and Armine Yalnizyan calling for the immediate cancellation of the P3 deals and a commitment to the public financing of new hospital infrastructure. Their arguments about increased costs and loss of accountability in the P3 hospitals echo those made by advocates for quality public health care for years, and they also recommend your government move to an accrual accounting system to eliminate the systemic bias against public investment in infrastructure, and remind us all that low interest rates make it a good time to invest.

     We believe Ontarians are interested and fully capable of understanding the financial arrangements being made on their behalf, and we think it will serve you well to engage them in a transparent policy exercise around health care funding, beginning with the funding of infrastructure. We urge you to make a full public disclosure of the funding arrangements for these projects immediately.

      We look forward to meeting with you at your earliest convenience to discuss ways to improve the quality of health care for all Ontarians.

Yours sincerely,
signed xxx"

>>"Attn:  Hon. Chris Bentley

     Your cabinet colleague, the Hon. George Smitherman, the Minister of Health and Long-term Care, has recently spoken strongly in favour of the need for solutions to health care issues to emanate from the community.  It is in this spirit that I address this message to you, the MPP representing my riding of London West.

     As the Chairperson of the London chapter of the Ontario Health Coalition, it troubles me to hear that the Premier'= s Office and the Ministry of Health are actually entertaining the corporate lobby's views on P3 hospital issues.  I need not remind you that P3s are bad deals for the citizens of Ontario.  During the election campaign, you astutely noted so yourself.  These privatization schemes must be canceled before it is too late.

     At present, no P3 hospitals exist in the province.  The Liberal government need not fear penalties for reverting P3 projects to public hospitals.  To delay, however, is to risk destruction of the public health care system.  Subject to the onerous terms of the North American Free Trade Agreement, for-profit corporations, once granted unfettered access to the public domain, would prove to be virtually impossible to dislodge.

    May I enlist your support in putting these privatization schemes to a well deserved end? Will you lobby your cabinet colleagues and encourage them to support the deprivatization of hospitals?  At the very least, are you willing to work to expose the details of these very secretive and detrimental business arrangements?

I eagerly await your response. Sincerely Yours, Peter Bergmanis, London Health Coalition"

>>> George Smitherman
Minister of Health and Long-Term Care
       " Mr. Smitherman, I hope that I'm mistaken in my understanding that your leader is now waffling on his promise to keep Ontario's hospitals and clinics out of the hands of profit-seeking enterprise .

As I recall, he said: "I am committed to ensuring that all Ontario hospital facilities are publicly owned. In terms of P3 projects already underway, a Liberal government would work to make these new facilities publicly owned as quickly as possible."