TORONTO — Ontario's Liberal government has introduced legislation aimed at improving patient care which calls for some major changes to the $50-billion health-care system.
The 14 Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs) set up by the Liberals will be given an expanded role while the Community Care Access Centres (CCACs) created by the previous Tory government will be shut down.
The LHINs will be responsible for primary care, home and community care, which the government says will improve and integrate delivery of front-line services.
They will also get additional responsibility for "planning and performance" of primary care providers, including doctors, who have been locked in a lengthy battle with the Liberals over a new fee schedule.
Health Minister Eric Hoskins isn't prepared to put a number on it, but says he expects "significant savings" from getting rid of the CCACs, and expects most of their front-line staff will "be moved over" to the LHINS.
Hoskins says the legislation also formalizes the relationship between public health units, boards of health and the LHINs, and will help integrate the different parts of the health-care system.
"This will allow us to work with primary care providers to identify what services are available, to look at the needs of communities and do that based on population, and then to plan exactly how services can be improved," he said. "We're creating an implementation team of experts that will help this process go forward."
The province spends $90 million a year to run the LHINs, which are responsible for doling out $25 billion a year in spending — half of the huge health-care budget.
In her 2015 report, auditor general Bonnie Lysyk said no LHIN had ever met all of its performance targets, and she found the Liberals responded by relaxing the targets.
NDP Leader Andrea Horwath says the Liberals have "thrown our health-care system into a complete state of crisis" and he has little confidence in their ability to fix the situation.
"After 13 years they've done nothing but destroy our health-care system," said Horwath. "Why would anybody think they're going to be able to fix it with the piece of legislation they tabled this afternoon?"
