BC Conservatives amplify voices of doctors concerned about province’s new health act

What do 58 British Colombian healthcare workers and over 5,000 citizens have in common on November 9th they all came together for a day of action against BC’s new health act it will extend mandates now to every health profession um where that wasn’t the case before uh

It will also mean that as a doctor if you provide advice that is your medical opinion that’s the best advice knowing on a patient and it goes against what the government says you could be fined up to $200,000 and spend 6 months in jail Dre hrey here with Rebel news standing in front of the BC legislature after an event took place after question period that event was over 5,000 people many of whom were health care workers signing postcards that were then delivered to the conservative party of BC leader John rustad who then went into the house

During question period and presented them take a look thank you uh honorable chair and rise today to present a petition and this is on behalf of the 17,500 signatures that we we presented last spring these are thousands more petitions in the form of postcards that

Will be going to every member uh in this legislature and the petition is an effort that was led of course by the uh uh many of the Frontline healthcare workers the doctors the nurses chiropractors uh and many others uh that are so concerned about the um uh about

The new uh the new legislation that is going to be implemented this year so thank you madam Mr Speaker presenting this position now I was in the gallery while that occurred alongside close to 60 different Health Care Professionals who came in person all sounding the alarm against the health care

Professions occupation act that act I’ve done many reports on before it was passed it was called Bill 36 and critics of it believe that it’s going to Grant the government sweeping powers to dictate how they are supposed to advocate for their patients there’s much more to be concerned about this bill and

In this report I’m going to interview rustad a little bit further about that as well as touch base with one of two of the main organizations that were behind the postcard campaign her name is ingred with BC Rising but I also want to mention that the Canadian Society for

Science and ethics in medicine was also spearheading this campaign and you can find out information about both of those groups in the description box below the public and the professions at large have no idea about this act and the impact that it’s going to have on their professions and the health of of

Patients so over 5,000 were given to John rustad today and he I guess somehow made that into a petition we’ll show you a little bit of what happened in the house and then we’ll get to him today in the gallery with the healthcare workers are here they represent the backbone of

Our health care System they have spent decades serving patients serving their Community caring for the people in their communities many of these Health Care Professionals have taken time away from serving their patients to be here today because they feel it is that important they’re concerned about health care

They’re concerned about the fact of their shortages in Staffing they’re concerned about the ER closures they’re concerned quite frankly about the loss of freedom in healthcare and they’re concerned about the me medical tyranny that this government is putting on the control of healthc care in this province so the question Mr

Speaker that I’m proud to be asking here today on behalf of thousands of healthcare workers across this province and as well as on behalf of the members that are here present today on the Canadian Society for the science and ethics and medicine to the premier will you acknowledge the feedback from

Thousands of healthcare workers from across Ross this province who are asking you to pause on the Health Professions occupations act and return to the drawing board or do to you intend to continue down this path of medical tyranny minel uh thank you very much honorable speaker uh the Health

Professions and occupations Act was passed by the legislature um honorable speaker it was the result of years of consultation first consultation leading to the Kon report then precedented consultation with all parties in the legislature then unprecedented consultation with indigenous people the vast majority of that consultation took place with health

Professionals it had record hours of debate in this legislature 47 hours of debate and as the member will know it was supported at second reading by the conservative party’s house leader who spoke in favor of it in the debate including the important issues of transparency which which uh which it

Provides Ides for patients we are we are implementing the Health Professions and occupations act and we will continue to do so so what we’re seeing is healthc Care Professionals that have taken time away from their patients that have taken time away from their communities they care about serving patients and

Communities they care about health care and about delivering good health care and they are concerned the Health Professions Act is taking away their ability to be able to service their their patients in the way that they want to if they want to give medical advice the health actors is saying they have to

Follow the government’s guidelines not their own experience not their own years profession and their knowledge of the patients and it’s just wrong and it it goes much much deeper than that but this is why they’ve taken time here today to protest to the NDP government to say

Look pause this act let us actually do a proper engagement with healthcare workers not just with the boards that have signed non-disclosure agreements but actually be able to get the feedback and get it right so that we can better Serve the People in British Columbia you had a significant group of healthcare

Workers in the gallery today and you had a sea of postcards tell us about how many postcards you had and and what the process was because now it’s a petition just for clarity so we’re actually building on a petition that we brought in last year we had 17,500 signatures

From people across this province it’s one of the larger petitions that legislator’s ever seen and so what the healthc Care Professionals said is is they wanted to do something more so what they what they did is they actually put together postcards where they would go out to patients where they would go to

Healthcare workers and get them to sign these postcards that will actually now be delivered to mlas demanding sort of a response and demanding to stand up and fight against this bill fight against what’s going on and so the hope is that you know all of this is uh just one more

One more fight in an ongoing battle to change our health care for the better and I’m really proud of the healthcare workers and all the time they put in to do this there’s I think it was somewhere between five and 6,000 of these postcards that we delivered in the

Legislature here today and Counting and you can continue to send those cards we have the link to do so in the description box below but one of the responses that Health Minister Adrien dicks gave is that this bill which is now a legislation has had so many hands

On it he’s saying there’s been so many people consulted what do you say in response to that well what I would say is the initial consultation they did was nothing about the actual bill it was just some very high level things that everybody could agree on when it

Actually came to getting into do developing the bill that’s when they had these non-disclosure agreements put in place nobody could talk about it they weren’t even able to tell their members within their within their health colleges and so to me it’s very disingenuous that he comes out and says

They had this great um consultation because they didn’t and it is sad the way this Minister portrays this act and what it is doing in terms of healthc care in this province and I want to ask you know today at noon we will have healthc Care Professionals out on the back steps of

The legislature the conservative party will be out joining them to talk about this issue and talk about healthc care in this province I invite all members to come out and to hear their words to hear what they’ll be presenting because they they believe passionately in this and they disagree with this Minister

Particularly in this heavy handed and ton death approaches we’re even hearing here in the answer here today so my question quite frankly Mr Speaker to the premier is during the government’s so-called consultation process that the minister just outlined why were so many non-disclosure agreements signed with British Colombians healthc care boards

Uh honorable speaker uh the um uh the Health Professions and occupations Act was a result of unprecedented consultation including uh and very significantly consultation um with opposition parties honorable speaker who were involved in its development honorable speaker the legislature is responsible for the law that everyone was involved in its development one of

The really important principles that all members the member uh uh for couchin the leader of the third party the member for colonal Lake Country who represented their caucuses in those discussions was the importance also in a time when we’ve had the Imp Plain Sight report of Consulting with indigenous people so Not

Only was there unprecedented consultation uh with the broader Community with professionals with opposition parties and a very significant debate in the legislature honorable speaker but there was significant consultation with indigenous people that is reflected in this act I think it’s an extraordinary thing now I know many people including healthc Care

Professionals don’t even know that this act exists so what is one or two things that you think are the most egregious about it well I think first of all the fact that it will extend mandates now to every health profession um where that wasn’t the case before uh it will also

Mean that as a doctor if you provide advice that is your medical opinion that’s the best advice knowing on a patient and it goes against what the government says you could be fined up to $200,000 and spend six months in jail and so what this is doing is is actually

Creating a really negative um environment for our healthcare workers it makes it much more difficult to attract healthcare workers and we’re seeing doctors leaving this problems because they do not want to be under this under this type of tyranny and so that is the impact of this bill along of

Course with the other measures we have a crisis in our healthare system we need everybody back working that we can have in our healthare system if you appreciate that Rebel news has never backed down from exposing medical tyranny please consider chipping in to help us cover the cost to do so

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Rebel News spoke with Conservative Party of B.C. leader John Rustad moments after he hosted close to 60 concerned medical professionals in the provincial legislature and submitted over 5000 postcards from citizens demanding that B.C’s new Health Professions and Occupations Act be repealed.

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