Manitoba wants new federal dollars to improve mental health care and family medicine, feds say
Canada's premiers announced Monday they had accepted new federal health proposal
Better access to mental health services and family doctors and tackling system backlogs are Manitoba's priorities for its share of the new health-care funding agreement with the federal government, federal Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos says.
"They really want to invest in the retention and recruitment of health workers. They also, I think, would like to invest in mental health and greater access to family medicine," Duclos said about Manitoba's share of the money.
Duclos, federal Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc, Premier Heather Stefanson, Health Minister Audrey Gordon and Finance Minister Cliff Cullen met Friday morning at the Manitoba Legislative Building to talk about the new funding.
Stefanson and Gordon wouldn't talk to media about how the province will use its $1.2 billion share of the $25 billion.
Stefanson also didn't say when she would comment publicly about the meeting.
Duclos said the next step for the province is to submit an agreement in principle to Ottawa, detailing where it wants to invest the money.
The federal ministers and province will then work on creating an action plan in the next weeks and months, he said.
"I think it's going to be happening quite quickly, because the signals are very good. We are on the same page on the actions, the priorities, the results we want to have for workers and patients," Duclos said.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with Canada's premiers last week to pitch a new 10-year, $196-billion federal health-care plan, of which $46.2 billion is new money.
Of that, $25 billion has been set aside for separate deals with each province and territory, aimed at directing funds toward a set of specific priorities, including primary care, mental health and hiring more doctors and nurses.
The premiers gathered Monday to announce they had accepted the proposal, ending months-long negotiations.
Duclos and LeBlanc then embarked on a cross-country tour, holding bilateral meetings with provincial and territorial leaders to finalize the deal and discuss where the funding will be allocated.
The ministers have now met with 10 government leaders and expect to sit down with the rest next week.
"I'm very enthusiastic, as the week concludes, that we'll quickly get to agreements in principle … which allow the federal money to be available," said LeBlanc.
Duclos was asked what he thought of the province asking for more money for health care, while planning to spend $200 million as part of an affordability package Stefanson calls a "carbon tax relief fund."
"We spoke about that today," he said. "We obviously want the [upcoming] federal dollars to be invested incrementally to the … investments in health.
"The federal government's dollars can't replace the provincial dollars."
Gordon, who spoke at a different news conference on Friday, wouldn't give specifics about how Manitoba wants to use the health money, saying the federal government has set out four priority areas and "they're all important to Manitobans."
She did say she wants to see the federal government streamline credential recognition for newcomers who were health professionals elsewhere, in order to get them working in Manitoba sooner to help address the backlogs choking the system.
Gordon said her team is ready to get the action plan done so those dollars can flow into the provincial budget as soon as possible.
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With files from Bartley Kives