Ottawa, Manitoba working to get new health dollars in provincial budget

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This article was published 17/02/2023 (933 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Negotiations for a new bilateral health-care funding agreement could wrap “quite quickly,” as the Manitoba government looks to receive promised federal dollars in time for its spring budget.

On Friday, Premier Heather Stefanson, Health Minister Audrey Gordon and Finance Minister Cliff Cullen met with federal counterparts Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos and Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc to launch negotiations for targeted health-care spending on four priority areas.

Duclos and LeBlanc embarked a cross-Canada tour to meet with provincial governments after Canada’s premiers accepted a new 10-year, $196 billion health funding deal Monday. The offer includes a top-up to the Canada Health Transfer and $25 billion for one-on-one spending agreements on targeted areas.

Gordon said all the parties agreed to move quickly to sign the agreement-in-principle and develop the action plan required before any dollars are transferred under the bilateral deal.

“As soon as the (federal) health minister is ready to sit down and get to work, my team is ready,” Gordon said at an unrelated press conference at the Grace Hospital Friday morning. “I said we need to start working on those action plans. I would like to see us start as early as this afternoon.

“Manitoba is ready and we need to have the participation of the federal government to get it done.”

Gordon said the Progressive Conservative government wants the additional dollars in its coming spring budget.

She highlighted credential recognition for internationally trained health-care workers, surgical backlogs and primary care as priority areas for the Manitoba government.

“We need the federal government’s support and agreement that they will streamline the processes for individuals to get their credentials recognized,” she said.

Immediately following the meeting at the Manitoba legislature, both Duclos and LeBlanc took questions from reporters. Stefanson did not address waiting media.

Duclos said he is very confident the two parties will be able to come to an agreement in the short term. The Manitoba government must now sign an agreement-in-principle, develop an action plan to show how the federal dollars will be spent and identify priorities.

“I think it’s going to be happening quite quickly because the signals are very good,” Duclos said.

“We are on the same page on the action, the priorities, the results we want to have for workers and patients.”

The minister said Ottawa is in alignment with Manitoba on priorities, which include recruitment and retention of health workers, with a particular focus on immigration, mental health and access to family medicine.

LeBlanc said his government knows the provinces are counting on the funding in the coming fiscal year.

“If we work quickly together with them — and that was our offer and our desire, as I think was the desire of the government of Manitoba — then Manitobans and Canadians in other provinces would be able to benefit from this incremental federal funding in the coming months,” he said.

The subject of provincial tax cuts and other benefits — including a $200 million program to mail cost-of-living cheques to Manitobans — amid requests for additional federal spending on health-care was discussed at Friday’s meeting, Duclos said.

“We obviously want the federal dollars to be invested incrementally to the existing provincial investments in health in this province and elsewhere in Canada,” he said.

“The federal government’s dollars can’t replace the provincial dollars.”

— With files from Carol Sanders

danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca