Dear Mayor and City Councilors,
Who is trying to intimidate Kingston?
This is not a trivial question. On March 18 you received a letter from Mr. Glen Wood, Chair of the Board of Directors of Providence Care, suggesting that if the arrangements for the new Providence Care hospital were questioned that Kingston might not get its new and needed hospital.
Is it Infrastructure Ontario telling Providence Care that if Kingston does not unquestioningly go along with their plans they will not fund infrastructure developments in Kingston? Is it the Ministry of Health? Or, is it the Premier’s office. Who is trying to intimidate Kingston?
Regardless, for the Government to think that we must obediently go along with their plans or risk losing needed services is insulting and contrary to the basic principles of an open society. It is even worse because the government has tried to keep a low profile on the hospital and shrouded the development in secrecy. A request for the cost comparisons that Infrastructure Ontario was supposed to undertake before deciding on the for-profit P3 approach has been ignored. A presentation to City Council in December contained no hard information. The RFP was released on December 21, 2012; when it would receive a minimum of public attention. An initial request for the RFP data sheet was met with a suggestion that we should make a freedom information request. When the RFP data sheet was supplied 48 sections were blacked out.
This will be Kingston’s largest health infrastructure project in decades and we have an obligation to put it under constructive public scrutiny to ensure that we have the best project possible. When all the independent studies of P3s, or Alternate Finance Models, in Ontario show that they cost more, it is responsible to enter these facts into the public debate. When there are many examples of P3s that are over budget, late or with complications, it is prudent to have a discussion about the funding, maintenance and operation of our new hospital.
For the government to deny the community basic information and the right to discuss the kind of hospital we want is as serious a concern as the for-profit model that they propose. It is certainly arguable that the two go hand in hand. The lack of transparency in this development may be necessary because the proposed approach would not with-stand serious public scrutiny.
There is a relatively straight forward alternative that would mitigate many of the problems associated with for-profit P3 hospitals. The RFP can be amended to remove the long-term financing and maintenance of the new hospital and return these duties to the public, non-profit sector.
How our new hospital is built, financed and operated is a significant municipal issue. Local rate payers, both through their municipal government and individually, are expected to contribute tens of millions of dollars to the project. The range of services, the kinds of jobs and the limitations imposed by long term contracts will all affect the vitality of our community and the care patients receive.
Thanks you for your attention to these issues.
Ross Sutherland,
‘Keep Our Hospitals Public’ Campaign Manager
