Health Committee on Nov. 4th, 2025

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

B.C. Interior Health recently reported a loss of seven obstetricans and gynecologists and four psychiatrists. We know that Kelowna, which is a drive of over an hour away, lost their pediatric ward temporarily, the pediatric ward for the area.

Do you think our region is losing doctors at a rate above replacement levels?

[Martin Johansen]

I would think so. We have been warned about this before, about the retirements that are coming. One challenge that happens is that a lot of doctors who have been providing service for the last 50 years are running larger panels of patients. They have larger groups of people to take care of. The demand from the population increase is there. When one of those physicians retires, they're not being replaced one-for-one. It's probably two or maybe three physicians to that one physician, because of the work-life balance that new health care workers are looking for.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Helena. I think your time is up. You have one second.

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Just quickly, have you, as a community, attempted to get any doctors to come in, yes or no? Have you, as a community, as the Town of Oliver, or has the board been trying to get new doctors?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Answer yes or no, please. We are over time.

[Martin Johansen]

Yes, we have.

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Now I go to the second questioner. That's from the Liberals, Mr. Eyolfson for six minutes.

[Doug Eyolfson, Liberal, Winnipeg West, MB]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Johansen, thank you so much for coming. I often travel to that area of B.C. I love it there.

I'm an emergency physician in Manitoba. I'm aware of the problems we have with rural area closures. I work in a community hospital in Winnipeg. We often receive patients from other areas because the hospitals there are closed. The ambulances come right to us. It's something I'm very familiar with.

Has there been any provincial response, in terms of how the Province of British Columbia is going to be responding to this?

[Martin Johansen]

We have formed a rural mayors group with a number of mayors from rural communities, and we are working with the Minister of Health, Josie Osborne. We are looking at solutions in different communities. One thing you'll find with rural communities is that a solution that works in one community doesn't necessarily work in another community, which adds some challenges to it. Some communities are considerably more remote than Oliver is, so they have trouble attracting physicians to come there. We have challenges in our community. We don't necessarily have all the amenities that people are looking for in those rural communities. They want to go to Penticton, so to speak.

One thing we were able to do in Oliver recently was to get a contract payment model for the physicians who come to our hospital, which creates pay equity. Before, they were attracted to Penticton; now it's the same pay whether you go to Penticton or Oliver.

[Doug Eyolfson, Liberal, Winnipeg West, MB]

Thank you.

One frustration I have had is this: I have a licence to practise in Manitoba; I also had a licence to practise in Ontario for a few years. You have to go through the whole application for licensing and pay a fee. Now it's $2,500 a year for that licence. I could hop across the border from Winnipeg to Kenora, Ontario, which often has shortages. I could hop across there for a few days and do some shifts, but I would have to maintain this Ontario licence. If I were to have a few days when I could come out to Oliver and practise, first of all, I would have to go through the process to apply for a licence in British Columbia, and then pay an annual fee for that licence.

Would a pan-Canadian licensure system, or some system where my credentials to practise would be recognized in any other province—even if on a sessional basis—help communities such as yours?

[Martin Johansen]

Absolutely. A bigger pool that we're able to draw from and attract physicians from would definitely help with the problems we're having. One thing we're doing in Oliver as well is building some dedicated housing for health care workers, so when physicians or nurses are able to come, they'll have a place to stay. We're trying to make it easier for people to come in and support our community. One thing, for sure, is the credentialing process; being able to just walk into the community and support the hospital would be amazing.

[Doug Eyolfson, Liberal, Winnipeg West, MB]

Thank you.

Ms. Hall, thank you so much for coming.

I also, from my emergency work, appreciate the difficulties with the lack of long-term care beds. We have a lot of patients actually sitting in emergency because they basically just can't cope at home anymore. They don't have an acute medical illness, so medicine won't admit these people, because they're not sick, but we have to find some place for them to go. They will often spend over a week on a stretcher in our hallway in the emergency department until we're able to find a bed for them. We've also had some barriers in that our provincial government, a number of years ago, closed three hospitals in Winnipeg, and also cancelled a $6-billion expansion in long-term care, and we're seeing the effects of it to this day.

You were talking about credentialing. I have the same question I had for Mr. Johansen. Would a system that allowed free mobility of workers, allowing them to travel between provinces, as opposed to having to apply for a licence in every single province...? Would it help if there was a way of having recognition of a licence throughout Canada? Do you believe that would help your staffing problems?

[Jodi Hall]

We are supportive of initiatives for labour mobility, especially as it relates to matters of foreign credential recognition. That is an area where many long-term care home employers are often trying to support newcomers, who are often working in homes as personal support workers. It would create opportunity for them to be employed in other areas within the long-term care home as well.

[Doug Eyolfson, Liberal, Winnipeg West, MB]

Thank you.

You mentioned that you are relying a lot on temporary foreign workers right now and the restrictions that have been put on it are causing problems for you. I'm hearing some advocates claiming that we should be getting rid of the temporary foreign worker program entirely. What effect would that have on staffing in your long-term care facilities?

[Jodi Hall]

According to Statistics Canada, since 2019, 40% of temporary foreign workers are employed in long-term care homes, so that is a significant impact for this sector.

[Doug Eyolfson, Liberal, Winnipeg West, MB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much. Time is up.

Thank you, Mr. Eyolfson.

I will go now to Monsieur Thériault for six minutes, please.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

It’s rather discouraging to hear about the reality that Quebec and the provinces are experiencing every day, as well as the challenges they must face.

Questions are being asked about the capacity of provinces to meet those needs. However, the current state of things must also be taken into account, especially when it comes to recruiting and retaining labour, as well as chronic underfunding of the health sector.

Underfunding has been going on for years. It was not rectified the last time the provinces came together to ask the federal government to increase its contribution to health expenditures from 21% to 35%. Among other things, it would significantly help with retaining labour.

Ms. Hall, I don’t know how this is playing out for you, but for us, there are many problems with retaining labour, especially nursing staff.

We saw the trend of private agencies popping up. They owe their existence to the fact that, in the public sector, nurses no longer have a quality working environment. And so, they would rather lose benefits and wages to be able to practise their profession decently.

What is that looking like for you?

[Jodi Hall]

When we look across the country, I think there absolutely is use of nursing agencies for long-term care. For us, it's a symptom of a much larger problem, which is the tremendous shortage we're facing. There are over 25,000 vacant positions, according to StatsCan data from the third quarter of 2024. From what we're hearing from our members on the ground, there's tremendous competition for the same cohort of employees. It's an incredibly challenging circumstance, and it has driven the use of agency nurses across the country.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

What do you think is behind the use of these agencies and this competition?

[Jodi Hall]

I think that the use of agency nursing has been driven by the shortages. It's incredibly difficult to work without sufficient staff or the required number of staff in a long-term care home, and it has a direct impact on working conditions when a full team is not in place.

Rather than putting staff and residents at risk, homes are moving to other options, such as agency nursing, while we continue to work to find strategies for recruitment.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

In Quebec, agencies popped up, particularly in the nursing care sector. It has a lot to do with the government’s requirements or intentions regarding health care. In any case, I don’t think any government or provincial premier whatsoever wants to create problems in health. Usually, they want to solve them with the money, the means and the resources they have available.

Nurses were being asked to work overtime hours, but without the possibility of being able to refuse. Those were therefore mandatory overtime hours.

It led to a particular phenomenon in Quebec. Health professionals felt that they were putting the lives of the public in danger. After working 18 consecutive hours, they felt they could make mistakes and could no longer ensure patient safety.

As a result, it caused stress. We saw nurses with serious mental health problems. They were living under pressure; they felt they could not give the best possible patient care.

The only thing we had to offer them was to refuse to let them go home. We then saw the trend of agencies popping up. They popped up like little mushrooms! These agencies recruited staff and took human resources away from the public system and put them back into the health network under very different conditions.

Am I wrong? Are you experiencing the same thing in your environment?

[Jodi Hall]

When we talk with our members across the country, we hear that what has driven the use of agency nursing has been the shortages that they're experiencing, in an effort to support retention so that people are not in working conditions that make it impossible—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have 30 seconds left.