Citizens for a Secular HDH
| Archives '08 Sep. |
| Some thoughts about the abolition of
community memberships in the hospital |
| June, 2008 • We faulted the previous board for a failure to be responsive and transparent to the community and the proposed governance model could potentially bypass any guaranteed accountability of board to community. • The previous administration sought legal advice on how to disenfranchise the rights of members and were advised that they had no legal options. This suggests that administrators might prefer a system without accountability . Why should we assume that a board appointed by the supervisor would support a different position? • The courts have already ruled that citizens who pay for membership rights cannot be disenfranchised. They have a right to expect that their democratic rights be upheld by the courts. Dr. Smith's interpretation of the Corporations Act does not appear to reflect this. • Since there exist in the community very strong feelings about corporate memberships a reduction of these rights might be open to a legal challenge. • Dr. Smith's comments in the Free Press imply that citizens who use membership rights are 'high jacking' a process that is "good". Clearly our situation shows the level of responsibility of the citizens as they acted to overturn a decision that courts in other parts of Canada would not permit, namely the takeover of a public hospital by a faith-based hospital (Saskatchewan, 2007) • We concur with Dr. Smith in the use of the recommendations of the Scott Quigly report for the selection of candidates for the board. We had already arrived at a position of successful settlement of the crisis with the deputy minister Sapsford before Dr Smith was appointed by the use of these recommendations. • Other supervisors have returned boards with voting corporate membership as part of effective community strategies. The position promoted here reflects Dr. Smith's personal ideology rather than the wishes of the community. • Over 2,300 citizens from all walks of life used their legal corporate rights when intransigent board members were unable or unwilling to negotiate openly with the public. Four board members had already resigned yet it was only membership use of corporate by-laws that was able to reverse this situation. Why would we accept a future that failed to guarantee these minimal checks and balances? • In most cases where community groups have demanded action the situation had become acute because of unresponsive boards or administrators and there was a lack of transparency in procedure. • Dr Smith would seem to have underestimated the extent of the concern in the community as well as the level of well-researched and well-informed action that had taken place prior to his arrival. This area has a very strong partnership of support with the hospitals in both fundraising and volunteer activity. Why would we accept anything less than full corporate membership? • To suggest that members act only when they are unhappy implies something very negative about the process. Instead it is a testimony to our faith in the skills of the people who come forward to serve. Not to have a local option to address the very few situations in which the board appears to act against the best interests of the community is to lose an important safeguard. It would be irresponsible of us to settle for a model where invervention of the Minister is the only recourse in a crisis. |