With Health Minister Dubé’s last minute retraction of his bonus scheme for only some imaging technicians, should we not question his ability to manage the Ministry of Health? Should he not resign on the grounds that he has been unable to fulfill the requirements of his job?
The basic tenant of his ministry is to provide a minimum of modern health care to all citizens of Quebec – all, as fellow human beings, not as members of linguistic or ethnic minorities. This requires the smooth running of his own ministry, keeping public confidence, and registering successful outcomes in its statistical summaries.
Today’s fractious question of providing salary bonuses to keep the system’s local health imaging technicians here in Quebec was the question creating havoc in the rural communities – we were apparently about to lose most imaging capacities. Too many medical technicians are attracted by Ontario’s higher salaries, by American offers, and even just by the imaginary conveniences of working in a city, as compared to working with our scattered rural population.
When Quebec finally did raise wages, incredibly, those raises were not offered to all technicians. Not to those working here, next door to Ontario. Isn’t this where our province’s attention – and funds – should go, first, not last? If at all?
Many political analysts have already interpreted this “shunning” of our
technicians as a message to the minorities they serve: you do not belong here!
The loss of obstetrics at Pontiac Community Hospital, and now the near closure of most imaging services away from downtown Gatineau, are pressures. We’ve received no other explanation. There is money to pay technicians across Quebec – but not for a few minority-heavy districts? How else are we to interpret that?
A dedicated minister of health would be fighting even his own government to provide him the resources to help the whole province. All ministers have to fight for the funding their projects require. So don’t these announcements, then withdrawals – plus all the alarm which the threat of imaging closures created – suggest we question Mr. Dubé’s appropriateness for this ministry? Is it not time for him – and the Premier – to recommit to the importance of good health, not to squeeze it to the breaking point so that the Premier can continue his privatization agenda?
Can’t Premier Legault, this so-called “good businessman”, present a human-balanced budget? And doesn’t all this tell us that it’s time for Minister Dubé to do the right thing, to step aside?
