British Columbia Budget 2002 |
For the past 15 years, the Government of BC and the BC Medical Association have settled compensation issues through negotiation. In February 2000, the two parties settled a Framework Memorandum to renew their relationship. This agreement included binding arbitration to resolve disputes.
Since December 2000, the parties have been working on a new agreement. After months of negotiations, the parties proceeded to mediation in July. Mediation ended in November when the parties agreed to proceed to arbitration.
On February 8, 2002, arbitrator Allan McEachern delivered his interim award on some, but not all, of the outstanding issues between the parties. The interim award gives BC physicians an estimated $307-million (16.2%) increase in 2001/02. When annualized through 2002/03, it means a $392-million (20.6%) increase.
This annualized increase for doctors is more than the total compensation increase for the entire regionalized health sector in 2002/03. While the estimated cost of the arbitrator award is $392 million for doctors (including volume increases of $60 million), the total compensation increase for the regionalized health sector is $325 million, including a $164-million increase for the province's 26,000 nurses.
The following table illustrates the costs described above and the annual cost of the compensation increases in the regionalized health sector. The table also shows the effect of the revenue measures implemented to fund these costs in 2002/03.
Over the 2001/02 to 2004/05 period, compensation settlements in the health care sector will cost over $1 billion annually. This includes almost $300 million for nurses and almost $400 million for doctors.