I'll take that. First of all, just generally, we do recognize that in parts of the country, and often more exacerbated in rural communities, there are shortages of doctors and nurses, and there's a need to take concrete steps to address that problem. Just to provide a general backdrop, the government will transfer, as the minister mentioned, $22.6 billion this year as part of the health transfer, and that grows by 6% a year. There's also an investment of $38 million a year through the health human resource strategy and the internationally educated health professionals initiative—$20 million for the health human resources strategy and $18 million for the internationally educated health professionals initiative to support efforts to ensure an adequate supply of doctors and nurses.
We're working with provincial and territorial governments to develop a common national assessment for internationally educated doctors, a common national assessment that would streamline the process for getting foreign doctors licensed to practice medicine in Canada. We think this would make a big difference in rural and remote communities that are eager to attract those doctors.
An interesting thing we did with the Government of Alberta and the nursing regulator in Alberta was to develop an assessment process that can be used overseas to evaluate the credentials of nurses who want to come to Canada. That will reduce the long delays many nurses face waiting to be licensed to practice their profession.
I think all those things apply generally, in some cases with planning. I think it is important that there be a concerted table that would involve all the players—the provinces, the regional health authorities in the provinces, Canada through Health Canada and also through Immigration Canada—because there has to be coordination. We have to be able to prioritize and focus on identifying specific provincial needs and bringing health professionals in to meet those needs, and hopefully be able to get people and give incentive to settle where the needs are greatest.
One of the other things that is happening is that we've had discussions—though I can't give you the outcome today—with the medical schools about who gets places. I think it's fair to say that people who come from rural areas may be somewhat more likely to go back home. I think the issue of the distribution of seats in medical schools is an important issue that has to be looked at. The rural parts of provinces should have fair access to some of those seats as well.