Like Performing Surgery on a Merry-Go-Round

Much needed reforms to Alberta's health system are hampered by constant firings and changes of direction.

Alberta Health Serivces CEO Stephen Duckett was fired as a result of his infamous (and hilarious) confrontation with reporters, becoming the latest casualty of the chaotic efforts to revamp Alberta’s tottering health system. That chaos has spread to the op-ed pages, where no one seems to be able to articulate any useful suggestions on the issue.

A Calgary Sun editorial states emphatically that “Duckett had to go” because he was inefficient and arrogant. But the same editorial declares he was only a “scapegoat” whose fate was sealed by “[r]epeated changes in direction, ministerial leadership, and political goals” handed down by the government. So in short, not only was Duckett mismanaging the AHS, but the people in charge of Duckett were mismanaging him. The Sun recommends “concrete solutions — and soon,” but of course doesn’t say what those solutions are, because no one knows.

A similarly muddled piece comes courtesy of the Edmonton Journal’s Paula Simons, who blames the disorder in the health system on “Alberta's revolving door series of health ministers and health policies” that has left reform efforts rudderless. This is a reasonable criticism, but Simons concludes her piece by slamming the AHS board for vowing to follow through on the plans Duckett laid out: “If the board of Alberta Health Services isn't prepared to change policy direction, [Health Minister Gene] Zwozdesky may still have a few more people to replace.” In other words, the solution to inconsistency is more change.

Some rare clarity can be found in this Calgary Herald editorial, which argues Duckett was fired not because of his job performance, but because Ed Stelmach’s government created a public relations circus by firing MLA Raj Sherman earlier in the week for criticizing his own party’s health policies. That harsh spotlight eventually swung to the hapless Duckett. The paper says just one of Duckett’s policies saved $700 million last year, his plan to introduce activity-based funding is a proven cost-saver, and ultimately he was the victim of “a government that looks increasingly to be using a hatchet when a scalpel would have been better.”