Most of my amendments with respect to this point have come directly from evidence and witness recommendations that you had before you. This comes from concerns that were raised by witnesses, but no one actually has put forward this exact language.
I thought this up myself. I put it to you that here's the circumstance, and we've heard it discussed even in clause-by-clause. What of people who are in a small and remote community? You have two problems. You have people who may be related to each other as they are in small practices, they know each other, and it may be difficult to find independent health professionals to provide a truly independent written opinion.
Knowing from friends of mine who are medical practitioners in remote communities, they quite often use video consults. I wanted to make this possible under the law.
It may be that this could be taken as implied, and they could use video consults to obtain consent, but I felt it was worth inserting proposed subsection 241.2(6.1) to say that: “In communities where it is not possible to find another independent medical practitioner or nurse practitioner to provide the written opinion referred to in paragraph (3)(e), the opinion may be provided by recorded video conference by another independent practitioner or nurse practitioner from elsewhere in Canada”.
I hope this addresses the problem that was raised by quite a few witnesses.