Some Ontario doctors want their colleagues to reject a new fee agreement with the province when they vote on the deal
Sunday, even though they’ve been without a contract for two years.
The four-year deal would increase Ontario’s $11.5-billion physician services budget by 2.5 per cent a year, to $12.9 billion by 2020, and give doctors the power to co-manage the system with the Ministry of Health.
It also prohibits further unilateral fee cuts like the ones the government imposed last year, which the Ontario Medical Association says disrespected doctors.
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OMA president Dr. Virginia Walley says she knows the deal “isn’t perfect,” but adds it improves on the government’s previous under-funding of growth in the system.
Dr. Kulvinder Gill, an immunologist, is urging doctors to reject the tentative four-year deal, which would will increase the $11.5-billion physician services budget by 2.5 per cent a year, to $12.9 billion by 2020.
Physicians opposed to the agreement say the OMA should have stuck to its demand for binding arbitration, but Walley says the government wouldn’t budge on the issue so the association will continue to fight in court for that right.
A group called Concerned Ontario Doctors staged rallies and protest marches urging physicians to vote against the deal, but insisted it isn’t looking for more money for doctors, just adequate funding so patients get the services they need.