Alberta premier reveals plans to transfer hospitals away from AHS

At a UCP town hall event in Drayton Valley, Premier Danielle Smith revealed the next phases of her government’s restructuring of health care in Alberta.

At a UCP town hall event in Drayton Valley, Premier Danielle Smith revealed the next phases of her government’s restructuring of health care in Alberta, including plans to remove Alberta Health Services (AHS) as the operator of some hospitals and turn facilities over to other operators like Catholic health care provider Covenant Health.

The Alberta government is currently setting up a structure where the government retains ownership of facilities and leases them to AHS and is “prepared to also take away their authority to operate hospitals as well,” Smith said at the town hall on Aug. 17.

“Because if our operator isn't performing the services we need them to, we're going to take (the hospital) back,” Smith said.

“The next phase is to see how many of those hospitals that AHS currently operates that we can retake ownership over. We can't do it for all of them.”

Smith said this strategy will improve the delivery of health care and help eliminate service disruptions in rural hospitals by introducing two incentives into the existing system — competition and fear.

“When you're dealing with a monopoly, and they believe that they can deliver any type of care, and there are no consequences, they’re going to continue to deliver bad service. And competition is one option. That's why we're offering chartered surgical centres and why we're offering Covenant,” Smith said.

“But the other is the fear of having it taken away. That is going to be a very powerful competitive incentive for the managers to say, ‘Oh my goodness, if we continue to deliver terrible care in Drayton Valley, then somebody else is going to be chosen for the operator.’”