Three important matters being ignored

[Argus]

There are three extremely important jobs the federal government has been ignoring for the last ten years other than to make little tinkering and public relations efforts.

Health care.
Legal system
Natives.

They're being ignored because fixing them is extremely complex and time consuming, and no immediate obvious answer offers itself up. These are not things which can be solved with a few quick sound bites and a selfie. They're a complete mess, and getting worse every month.

Our health care system is deteriorating month by month, year by year. We're like frogs stuck in a pot of water that heats up slowly enough we don't quite notice it, but if you look back on how health care used to work - when finding doctors was easy, when long waits for operations or consultations were unusual, when you could walk into an ER room in any major city and be seen within minutes, you come to realize how far we've fallen.

Our legal system is a labourious,  time-consuming and expensive mess. All of it. Criminal, civil and family law courts are all swamped and cases take years to wind their slow, torturous way through the system, with very uncertain results. The provinces are bleating about how hard it is to even meet the supreme court's demand for a criminal trial in under two years! Yet in the UK the average takes less than 2 months. 

There are more and more natives claiming more and more money and doing nothing for it. The overall population rose 8% between the last two censuses but the aboriginal population rose 45%. More and more money is being siphoned off by non-working natives who, rather than being grateful, are bitter at their useless, purposeless lives.

And what is the plan? What's to be done? So far all we have is crickets from all three parties.

[Michael Hardner]

3 hours ago, Argus said:

There are three extremely important jobs the federal government has been ignoring for the last ten years other than to make little tinkering and public relations efforts.

Health care.
Legal system
Natives.

More than 10 years but I like where this post is going...

 

3 hours ago, Argus said:

They're being ignored because fixing them is extremely complex and time consuming, and no immediate obvious answer offers itself up. These are not things which can be solved with a few quick sound bites and a selfie. They're a complete mess, and getting worse every month.

And the government has no management culture, nor do politicians have any idea how to fix anything.  Still like the post... let's see where it goes.

 

3 hours ago, Argus said:

Our health care system is deteriorating month by month, year by year. We're like frogs stuck in a pot of water that heats up slowly enough we don't quite notice it, but if you look back on how health care used to work - when finding doctors was easy, when long waits for operations or consultations were unusual, when you could walk into an ER room in any major city and be seen within minutes, you come to realize how far we've fallen.

Agreed.  CIHI is a great resource and is now increasingly relied on by media for reporting but still a lot gets missed.  

ex. 1 million potentially unnecessary tests a year ???

http://globalnews.ca/news/3359201/canadians-undergo-more-than-1-million-potentially-unnecessary-medical-tests-treatments-a-year-report/

 

3 hours ago, Argus said:

.

Our legal system is a labourious,  time-consuming and expensive mess. All of it. Criminal, civil and family law courts are all swamped and cases take years to wind their slow, torturous way through the system, with very uncertain results. The provinces are bleating about how hard it is to even meet the supreme court's demand for a criminal trial in under two years! Yet in the UK the average takes less than 2 months. 

Mismanagement.  Politicians buy off labour by agreeing to expensive labour-heavy solutions to problems.  Sluggish and stupid bureaucracy etc.

3 hours ago, Argus said:

There are more and more natives claiming more and more money and doing nothing for it. The overall population rose 8% between the last two censuses but the aboriginal population rose 45%. More and more money is being siphoned off by non-working natives who, rather than being grateful, are bitter at their useless, purposeless lives.

I diverge from you here.  I wouldn't blame a group for a situation like this, but clearly the government invests in status quo and image marketing...

 

3 hours ago, Argus said:

And what is the plan? What's to be done? So far all we have is crickets from all three parties.

We need a sea change in Canadian culture.  My liberal friends never, repeat never, object to anything related to government expenditure and rarely will criticize government errors.  This is done because the misguided "run government like a business" edict was launched by the right-wing.  Government CAN'T run like a business, however it can be cost-effective, service-oriented, accountable, timely etc. etc. etc.  Conservatives have a smaller part, IMO, which would be to accept that things can't change overnight.

If there were to be questions of morality and identity, that's a different beast.  IMO we do that enough in our public 'sphere'.

Government should sponsor and encourage a truly PUBLIC web presence where they communicate clearly their plans, costs, and service levels and actively engage nonymous (ie. use your real name) citizens, stakeholders, and public service managers to light a fire under their own ass.  I would vote, maybe even campaign for, a party that proposed this.  The reason that stops this from happening, other than lack of vision, is that it would place the first government that implemented it in a terrible position.

[Spiderfish]

2 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

I diverge from you here.  I wouldn't blame a group for a situation like this, but clearly the government invests in status quo and image marketing...

While indigenous groups can't and shouldn't be blamed wholly for their current situation, it's no secret that indigenous leaders works every bit as much against their own cause as the Government does.   Take the FSIN in Saskatchewan for example.  They demanded that the premier of that province offer up an apology for the sixty's scoop.  The premier promptly agreed and said the Government is prepared to offer the apology promptly, saying they were "ready immediately. We are ready to do this next week", to which the response from the FSIN was that it had to be made on First Nation land.  The premier responded, saying  "We've reached out to First Nation groups to say 'you make the call,'" Wall said. "We will do it wherever and whenever."  Apparently the FSIN says that scheduling has been a factor, however anecdotal claims are that they have no interest in an apology at all, certainly not without a cheque attached.  Several articles seem to back this sentiment up.

For any meaningful healing and progress to be made, both parties have to be on the same page.  This is what I see as the fundamental problem with attempting to mend aboriginal relations and the failure seems to be not merely on the side of governments.

5 hours ago, Argus said:

They're being ignored because fixing them is extremely complex and time consuming, and no immediate obvious answer offers itself up. These are not things which can be solved with a few quick sound bites and a selfie. They're a complete mess, and getting worse every month.

What?  You mean an empty vacuous promise to take immediate government action on the 94 calls to action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission won't solve the problem? 

Trudeau has made a career of throwing fuzzy platitudes at issues and then ignoring the substance...even issues that are on his agenda (see ramming through legalization of marijuana, then leaving the details to individual provinces).  I personally have zero confidence that he has even the slightest ability to put any substance into any issue.

Edited September 14, 2017 by Spiderfish

[Moonlight Graham]

Agreed that these areas are problems, but health care is also a provincial domain of legal control constitutionally, not federal.  Though leadership of influence through the fed gov wouldn't hurt, but legislatively the fed's hands are largely tied.  Our healthcare system is so inadequate it's scary.  People with mental health issues it takes months to see a psychiatrist in some cities, and the treatment can be extremely inadequate, especially if you're in the ER.

[Argus]

3 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Agreed.  CIHI is a great resource and is now increasingly relied on by media for reporting but still a lot gets missed.  [/quote]

One of the major problems in holding government accountable is a lazy media. Hell, much of our national media is given over to covering whatever the US networks offer them at cut rate prices. Where is the comparison by media of how our health care system works compared to how it worked thirty years ago? I've never seen one. Where is the comparison between how it works now and how a similar system works in Norway or France? Never seen one.  How many Canadians even KNOW that you used to be able to get quick health care? That you used to be able to walk into an ER and not wait six or eight or ten hours to see a doctor? How many know you don't get such long waits in most other industrialized countries? Neither our political class nor our media class is much interested in informing them.

3 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Mismanagement.  Politicians buy off labour by agreeing to expensive labour-heavy solutions to problems.  Sluggish and stupid bureaucracy etc.

The wast is immense. The time consumed is huge. Plus there's vast injustice. We need to scrap our entire legal system and start again from the basics - and we can use the UK as a model since they seem to do it far better than we do.

3 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

I diverge from you here.  I wouldn't blame a group for a situation like this, but clearly the government invests in status quo and image marketing...

I wasn't actually blaming them. I was stating the reality. We have more and more natives, and they have no purpose in their lives if they're sitting on their asses with no job and no hope of a job. Many of the reserves are absolute sewers. The blame isn't all on the government, however. It seems to me that native leaders have worked a lot harder at getting apologies and condemning us and our history rather than working on solutions. And it also seems like too many native leaders are more interested in their own power and wealth than in doing what's best for their tribes. As far as getting an agreement with them on anything? Forget it. You don't get an agreement with 600+ tribal chiefs who have been told they are leaders of 'nations'.

What we need is a strong government proposal to break radically from the Indian Act, maybe seeking agreement from some individual tribes, and using them as volunteers to try a new system.

3 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Government should sponsor and encourage a truly PUBLIC web presence where they communicate clearly their plans, costs, and service levels and actively engage nonymous (ie. use your real name) citizens, stakeholders, and public service managers to light a fire under their own ass.

Opposition parties are all about open government until they are actually IN government. Then it's another story. Trudeau was supposed to be completely different. Yet he's done nothing to open up government and let people have information on what's going on.

[Argus]

50 minutes ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Agreed that these areas are problems, but health care is also a provincial domain of legal control constitutionally, not federal.  Though leadership of influence through the fed gov wouldn't hurt, but legislatively the fed's hands are largely tied.  Our healthcare system is so inadequate it's scary.  People with mental health issues it takes months to see a psychiatrist in some cities, and the treatment can be extremely inadequate, especially if you're in the ER.

The feds control the purse, and they control the law: the Canada Health Act, which governs the provincial services. They thus have the final say. And frankly, I think they need to take health care out of the hands of the provinces. It's become too big and too expensive, taking half their budgets and growing. And they suck at it.

[Moonlight Graham]

1 hour ago, Argus said:

The feds control the purse, and they control the law: the Canada Health Act, which governs the provincial services. They thus have the final say. And frankly, I think they need to take health care out of the hands of the provinces. It's become too big and too expensive, taking half their budgets and growing. And they suck at it.

That would need a constitutional amendment, which is extremely messy.  It would also need the provinces to sign off on it.  Politically there's just no way would the provinces give up that much power of responsibility and money to the feds.  Education and healthcare are 2 of the main responsibilities of the provinces.  They'd have to be given back something in return.  I just don't see it happening even it would improve healthcare hugely somehow.

[Michael Hardner]

11 hours ago, Argus said:

One of the major problems in holding government accountable is a lazy media. Hell, much of our national media is given over to covering whatever the US networks offer them at cut rate prices. Where is the comparison by media of how our health care system works compared to how it worked thirty years ago? I've never seen one. Where is the comparison between how it works now and how a similar system works in Norway or France? Never seen one.  How many Canadians even KNOW that you used to be able to get quick health care? That you used to be able to walk into an ER and not wait six or eight or ten hours to see a doctor? How many know you don't get such long waits in most other industrialized countries? Neither our political class nor our media class is much interested in informing them.

Although I generally agree with the 'lazy media' characterization, there are other major forces happening too: fewer resources to cover stories, lack of interest from 'the' public, and the scope/complexity of government has boiled over beyond what the average citizen could hope to pay attention to.
 

This is why I think that dedicated digital media could separate out topics that individuals are interested in, and cover them in more depth than a newspaper article or 3 minute TV news story.  They would also be able to cover issues continually.

 

11 hours ago, Argus said:

The wast is immense. The time consumed is huge. Plus there's vast injustice. We need to scrap our entire legal system and start again from the basics - and we can use the UK as a model since they seem to do it far better than we do.

I would suggest starting pilot projects, and improving them and increasing their domain of responsibility until we have built something better.  Then phase out the old system.  This can't be done with a mainstream-media-only type of coverage as they will find something wrong and push any change as failure.

There will be trade-offs - winners and losers - and we have to be ready to negotiate 'win win'.  Yes, that's a dirty word.  It's more like 'win win'/'lose lose'

 

11 hours ago, Argus said:

I wasn't actually blaming them. I was stating the reality. We have more and more natives, and they have no purpose in their lives if they're sitting on their asses with no job and no hope of a job. Many of the reserves are absolute sewers. The blame isn't all on the government, however. It seems to me that native leaders have worked a lot harder at getting apologies and condemning us and our history rather than working on solutions. And it also seems like too many native leaders are more interested in their own power and wealth than in doing what's best for their tribes. As far as getting an agreement with them on anything? Forget it. You don't get an agreement with 600+ tribal chiefs who have been told they are leaders of 'nations'.

What we need is a strong government proposal to break radically from the Indian Act, maybe seeking agreement from some individual tribes, and using them as volunteers to try a new system.

This sounds good on the surface, but unfortunately there is a culture of mistrust that makes people put more faith in their local officials than a federal government that changes with the wind, fails to provide basics, and is more invested in politics than results.  But ok.

 

11 hours ago, Argus said:

Opposition parties are all about open government until they are actually IN government. Then it's another story. Trudeau was supposed to be completely different. Yet he's done nothing to open up government and let people have information on what's going on.

Agreed.  So far I haven't seen anything substantive in terms of change, but a lot of words.  It's far easier to manage opinions than government and the Liberals are much better at the former anyway.

[August1991]

On 9/14/2017 at 0:36 PM, Argus said:

There are three extremely important jobs the federal government has been ignoring for the last ten years other than to make little tinkering and public relations efforts.

Health care.
Legal system
Natives.

According to English Canada's Ontario Left, there are always three extremely important issues:

-health care

-injustice

-an oppressed group (at present, aboriginals)

=====

Note to Americans: With Obamacare, trust me, you will never stop talking about health care. Even now, it is a "public issue".

Edited September 16, 2017 by August1991

[Argus]

6 hours ago, August1991 said:

According to English Canada's Ontario Left, there are always three extremely important issues:

-health care

-injustice

-an oppressed group (at present, aboriginals)

According to French Canadians the only issue of importance over the past century has been French language rights.

[Michael Hardner]

21 minutes ago, Argus said:

According to French Canadians the only issue of importance over the past century has been French language rights.

I can't find a contradictory poll, but I don't think this is true at all.  They're currently embroiled in a lot of the same discussions on multiculturalism that English Canada is, and wanted to implement a ban on religious clothing even.

[cannuck]

Legal system?   It is a joke.  Civil courts act as illegal collection agencies for banks and financial institutions.   Criminal courts are tied up with conflict between law and political expedience.  I believe the reason is that we are just too close to the USA and believe that the legal system should look more like theirs than our original UK model.

Sick care?   Same as above: we are far too close to the US, and have adopted much of the practices used down there for business of sick care to participate in the legal and insurance factors associated with delivery of service.   More to the US-like worship of drugs as the absolute solution to everything.  The Yanks thing sick care is a business, the rest of the world knows it is a social service, and we are caught somewhere in between - paying US costs for insurance, legal and drug habits.

Aboriginals?   IMHO very simple: if we agree that we owe them something as a country, then we should cut a cheque every month to each and every treaty number out there.  They need to be Canadians in every sense of the word, not some idiotic fantasy of being hundreds of sovereign nations within one state.  Why pay the people in question?  If there is ever to be some kind of accountable government at the band level, let the leaders get their funding by taxing their constituents, just as does every other government in Canada.  As it is, the vast majority of the bux are paid through the Feds to "preferred consultants" of the "Indian Industry" before being placed unaccountably into the hands of chief and council, where precious little of it is ever delivered as a service to the community or band members.   When hear pure BS such as "WE" should be providing them with better housing and drinking water - the truth is we have paid far, far more out to accomplish exactly these things, but nobody is delivering anything other than racking up more and more personal fortunes in the middle.  Most reserves out here have 90% unemployment - so given a massive workforce, far, far more than adequate financial resources why is it that there is nobody within each community building homes and utilities, maintaining homes and utilities and generally doing all of those things that EVERY other Canadian community does?   Oh, yeah, I forgot the Liberal/liberal answer:  "it's all Whitey's fault".

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 2017-09-14 at 5:32 PM, Michael Hardner said:

More than 10 years but I like where this post is going...

 

And the government has no management culture, nor do politicians have any idea how to fix anything.  Still like the post... let's see where it goes.

 

Agreed.  CIHI is a great resource and is now increasingly relied on by media for reporting but still a lot gets missed.  

ex. 1 million potentially unnecessary tests a year ???

http://globalnews.ca/news/3359201/canadians-undergo-more-than-1-million-potentially-unnecessary-medical-tests-treatments-a-year-report/

 

 

 

 

Regarding unnecessary testing, here is a response at the national level:

https://choosingwiselycanada.org/

and provincially, for example:

https://choosingwiselycanada.org/campaign/nl/

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/choosing-wisely-pat-parfrey-1.3914592

The physician profiled above visited more than 200 GPs in their offices to discuss this initiative with them. Outliers are being contacted to discuss their testing patterns. 

 

 

[bush_cheney2004]

On 9/17/2017 at 12:48 AM, cannuck said:

...Sick care?   Same as above: we are far too close to the US, and have adopted much of the practices used down there for business of sick care to participate in the legal and insurance factors associated with delivery of service.  

 

I think not, else there would be far more capacity in the provinces for even the most basic of medical services, instead of long wait lists.

Several provinces actually have contracts with providers in the U.S. where there is excess capacity.

[SpankyMcFarland]

Canada is already a mixed public and private health system but the private sector will get larger and will require more legal recognition. 

All health systems are imperfect. The US has centres of excellence but can't control costs. The UK, much maligned, has done a relatively good job at controlling costs and provides better drug coverage than we do. We need to look more carefully at the various systems beyond the Anglosphere esp. in Europe and pick the best from each.

Edited September 19, 2017 by SpankyMcFarland

[Argus]

10 hours ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

Canada is already a mixed public and private health system but the private sector will get larger and will require more legal recognition. 

All health systems are imperfect. The US has centres of excellence but can't control costs. The UK, much maligned, has done a relatively good job at controlling costs and provides better drug coverage than we do. We need to look more carefully at the various systems beyond the Anglosphere esp. in Europe and pick the best from each.

I was very impressed with a story I caught a month or two back about New Zealand's pharmacare program and how it had drastically lowered prices of key drugs, making them far less expensive than they are in Canada. New Zealand's population is considerably less than that of Ontario or Quebec, about the same as BC. How can they negotiate prices with drug companies to that extent and we can't?

Edited September 19, 2017 by Argus

[August1991]

On 9/16/2017 at 12:15 PM, Argus said:

According to French Canadians the only issue of importance over the past century has been French language rights.

Past century?

Argus, in French North America, there have been two issues for centuries: language and religion.

======

In Bulgaria, people are still Christian and they still speak Bulgarian. In Montreal, people still speak French. 

Edited September 21, 2017 by August1991

[PIK]

Native issues is the same as poverty and homelessness, it is now a industry .And of course big high paying jobs are being created and nothing gets done. AQnd the native attitude that the white man has to pay for eternally, has to come to a end. And another thing if you community is so far up north or in the middle of nowhere and you can't survive without daily flights or trucking supplies in, then you must move.

[cannuck]

On 9/21/2017 at 2:49 PM, PIK said:

Native issues is the same as poverty and homelessness, it is now a industry .And of course big high paying jobs are being created and nothing gets done. AQnd the native attitude that the white man has to pay for eternally, has to come to a end. And another thing if you community is so far up north or in the middle of nowhere and you can't survive without daily flights or trucking supplies in, then you must move.

Bingo.   Absolute bullseye.

[August1991]

On 9/21/2017 at 4:49 PM, PIK said:

Native issues is the same as poverty and homelessness, it is now a industry .

....

I tend to agree.

=====

But Bulgarians still speak Bulgarian, and are Christian.

Was there an "industry" to resurrect the Bulgarian language? Or did Bulgarians - like people in Quebec - do this on their own?

===============

Far more broadly, we in the rich West think of the future. Ignorant people in the East - or simply ignorant people, such as Canada's native "industry" - want to correct the past.

For this, I have always liked the phrase of Deng Xsiao Ping: "Who cares whether the cat is white or black as long as it catches mice."

[blackbird]

On 9/14/2017 at 9:36 AM, Argus said:

There are three extremely important jobs the federal government has been ignoring for the last ten years other than to make little tinkering and public relations efforts.

Health care.
Legal system
Natives.

They're being ignored because fixing them is extremely complex and time consuming, and no immediate obvious answer offers itself up. These are not things which can be solved with a few quick sound bites and a selfie. They're a complete mess, and getting worse every month.

Our health care system is deteriorating month by month, year by year. We're like frogs stuck in a pot of water that heats up slowly enough we don't quite notice it, but if you look back on how health care used to work - when finding doctors was easy, when long waits for operations or consultations were unusual, when you could walk into an ER room in any major city and be seen within minutes, you come to realize how far we've fallen.

Our legal system is a labourious,  time-consuming and expensive mess. All of it. Criminal, civil and family law courts are all swamped and cases take years to wind their slow, torturous way through the system, with very uncertain results. The provinces are bleating about how hard it is to even meet the supreme court's demand for a criminal trial in under two years! Yet in the UK the average takes less than 2 months. 

There are more and more natives claiming more and more money and doing nothing for it. The overall population rose 8% between the last two censuses but the aboriginal population rose 45%. More and more money is being siphoned off by non-working natives who, rather than being grateful, are bitter at their useless, purposeless lives.

And what is the plan? What's to be done? So far all we have is crickets from all three parties.

Excellent subject you raise.  I agree.   Unfortunately I don't see any party putting forward viable solutions.  Trudeau is a master at sweet words, but practically no action.  He knows how to speak fair things that will appeal to minorities, but accomplishes very little.  It's all talk and no action. 

Even an ordinary citizen has very little input.  I've had the feeling for a long time, that communications such as letters or Emails to elected officials just fall on deaf ears, but maybe I'm being too cynical.

One problem is that significant improvements would probably take a vast amount of money and then there is the suspicion that much of the money would be wasted in government bureaucracies or siphoned off by special interests and not get to where it should go.  I don't trust government with taxpayer's money.  I think they waste vast amounts and often make bad decisions.

Edited September 23, 2017 by blackbird

[eyeball]

On 9/14/2017 at 1:02 PM, Michael Hardner said:

ex. 1 million potentially unnecessary tests a year ???

http://globalnews.ca/news/3359201/canadians-undergo-more-than-1-million-potentially-unnecessary-medical-tests-treatments-a-year-report/

 

From your article;

Quote

But once we’re cared for, we’re a satisfied group – Canadians are generally happy with the quality of the health care they receive compared to the international rankings, according to a new Canadian Institutes for Health Information (CIHI) report released Thursday morning.

This doesn't seem to jibe with all the complaining going on about how crappy our health-care system is.  Perhaps doctors in a publicly funded system make better judgements about their referrals and have figured out that rushing things is largely unnecessary. That said,  I seem to know a lot more people who've gone in to see their doctors because they weren't feeling well and were receiving heart surgery within days than people who've been put off until they die. It's obvious that the system can also move bloody fast when it needs to.

Edited September 24, 2017 by eyeball

[-TSS-]

But isn't your health care-system still way better than across the border in the US? At least nobody in your country will have to choose between death or getting bankrupt because you really can't afford some operation.

Edited September 24, 2017 by -TSS-

[cannuck]

1 hour ago, -TSS- said:

But isn't your health care-system still way better than across the border in the US? At least nobody in your country will have to choose between death or getting bankrupt because you really can't afford some operation.

I live in Canada, but have business on both sides of the border.   Sick care in the US can be extremely good - IF and ONLY IF you have a really good insurance plan or are so rich a few hundred grand is no big deal.   In Canada, as you mention, nobody thinks twice about sick care, as you know with absolute certainty your costs (except transportation and in some cases drugs) are fully covered.  In the US, very different.  Obummercare has not solved much of the problem.   When it comes to starting a business, this is a HUGE consideration in the US, whereas in Canada, it is a zero concern.

NO medical system is perfect, since it can be very complex and depends a great deal on skills of the practitioner(s).   We have some  very good doctors up here, some centers of excellence and some forgotten backwaters (that require transportation - but that is the nature of being an extremely large country with very small population).   The US has the same thing in greater extremes, but it has the massive barrier to entry of financial privilege.

In general, we pay less than half as much as the US does for sick care, and we get far better results.  The US can not understand that medicine is (or at least SHOULD be) a social service.   It thinks everything can be and must be a business.   Sadly, we copy some of that and pay the insurance costs to fund the US legal business that preys upon US people's medical needs.

[Argus]

1 hour ago, -TSS- said:

But isn't your health care-system still way better than across the border in the US? At least nobody in your country will have to choose between death or getting bankrupt because you really can't afford some operation.

Yes, it's better, but that's a pretty low bar to surpass.