The politically inspired purge of senior Alberta Health Services officials by the United Conservative Party that has now begun is likely to paralyze decision making throughout the provincial health care system.
The six senior executives shoved out of their roles yesterday included the president and CEO of AHS, Mauro Chies, who was named interim president and CEO on April 4, 2022, and only assigned the post “permanently” in March this year.
Also “no longer in their role,” as just-appointed AHS Board Chair Lyle Oberg put it in a memorandum emailed to AHS staff, physicians and volunteers yesterday, are:
- Dr. Francois Belanger, Vice President of Quality and Chief Medical Officer
- Colleen Purdy, Vice President of Corporate Services and Chief Financial Officer
- Tina Giesbrecht, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary
- Geoffrey Pradella, Chief Strategy Officer
- Dean Olmstead, Chief Program Officer, Capital Management
Nothing in the memorandum indicated if any of the six will stay at AHS in other roles.
Let’s face it, though, no one can expect to remain very long in a senior health care position in Alberta as long as the premier is Danielle Smith, who for all intents and purposes promised health care chaos when she won the leadership of the UCP after former premier Jason Kenney was forced out by the party’s radical Take Back Alberta faction.
She is now delivering on that pledge. As Mr. Kenney used to say, “Promise made, promise kept!”
Readers will recall that during the leadership campaign, Ms. Smith vowed to replace both the board and CEO of Alberta Health Services. That she has now done, and then some, replacing the board with Dr. Oberg and five others on Nov. 8.
On the night of her victory in the UCP leadership contest, Ms. Smith promised she would order AHS management to double the province’s Intensive Care Unit capacity immediately – a task dismissed by actual experts at the time as impossible – “and if they can’t do that, then we will find others who can do it for them.”
Perhaps that’s what happened to Dr. Chies and his five colleagues. We’re unlikely ever to be told.
Regardless of what it was, decision paralysis is likely to reign at AHS for the indeterminate future as senior leaders wait for clear signals from politicians before moving ever so cautiously to do anything.
With the health care system still recovering from the pandemic, continuing to experience large numbers of COVID-19 hospitalizations, and coping with a worldwide shortage of nurses, doctors and other health care professionals, the impact of an apparent purge is likely to make things worse.
Getting rid of the six executives will also be expensive – although it’s unlikely to burn through all of the $45 million in labor relations costs forecast in the leaked briefing document about the planned breakup of Alberta Health Services.
An updated corporate organization list on the AHS website said yesterday that Sean Chilton has been named acting AHS president and CEO. If he gets a call about new ICUs, he’ll want to get right on that!
Also on the “executive team,” according to the web page, are:
- Kerry Bales, Chief Program Officer, Provincial Addiction & Mental Health & Correctional Health Services
- Gail Fredrickson, Interim Vice President, Community Engagement & Communications
- Karen Horon, Vice President, Cancer Care Alberta & Clinical Support Services
- Dr. Peter Jamieson, Interim Associate Medical Director, Clinical Operations
- Susan McGillivray, Interim Vice President, People & Health Professions
- Natalie McMurtry, Interim Vice President, Provincial Clinical Excellence
- Dr. Sid Viner, Vice President & Medical Director, Clinical Operations
- Ronda White, Chief Audit Executive, Internal Audit & Enterprise Risk Management
Commentators are bound to continue to puzzle over the objectives of the massive changes being brought to the health care system in Alberta, but a significant part of the premier’s motivation is clearly revenge for the role AHS played in the public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Throughout the pandemic she was associated with advocacy of quack COVID cures and in her leadership ambitions she had the support of extreme opponents of vaccinations, medical masking, and public health measures generally.
Despite repeated denials by Premier Smith and Health Minister Adriana LaGrange, the restructuring of AHS into four administrative silos also seems clearly designed to accommodate the privatization of large swaths of the public health care system, long advocated by Ms. Smith and her political allies on the extreme right.
As for Dr. Oberg, a physician who held several cabinet posts in the Klein and Stelmach governments and is known for his advocacy of privatized health care and out-of-pocket payments for such basic health services as mammograms and pre-natal ultrasounds, firing a group of senior executives must have seemed eerily familiar.
Alert readers will recall that as “learning minister” in 1999, he fired the entire Calgary Board of Education for alleged dysfunction, after the board split over the divisive shenanigans of a young school trustee named Danielle Smith.
It’s no surprise that phony Conservatives and Reformers don’t create jobs, they destroy them. This is further proof of that. Danielle Smith is copying her hero, Ralph Klein, so she can get private for profit healthcare in Alberta, which is what he wanted. Notice the pattern of how she rewards the same people who fired her, or helped cause her downfall as a politician. Lyle Oberg fired Danielle Smith from her position as a public school trustee. I wonder what salary Danielle Smith is giving him for his new role in restructuring AHS? Preston Manning had involvement with Danielle Smith and 8 of her Wildrose MLAs crossing the floor to become part of the Alberta PCs, led by Jim Prentice. Danielle Smith got turfed in her own riding, in 2015. What does Danielle Smith do? She gives Preston Manning a very generous salary of $253,000, and an expense account of $2 million to produce a Covid-19 report that is rubbish. Lyle Oberg was involved with some type of private hospital scheme in British Columbia, and that failed. As an Alberta PC cabinet minister, Lyle Oberg claimed to know about the skeletons in the closet. What were those? The Alberta PCs sacked him, and he had to sit as an independent MLA for a time.
Anonymous , Remember when Preston Manning bragged about creating the floor walking episode with Jim Prentice and Danielle Smith and her band of fools? What was so hilarious about it was the fact that he said that he had created it three months before it really happened and during that three months Smith and Prentice put on this comedy act of pretending to hate each other. Then when Manning found out how unpopular it was he tried to deny the fact that he had anything to do with it. He has always been a loser politically.Let’s hope some of the idiots who helped to elect her have relatives effected by this stupidity she is creating . I think doctors and nurses will be leaving by the bus load, l can’t see them dumb enough to stay when they don’t need to. They are needed everywhere.
Alan K. Spiller: You certainly have it right. Remember how Ralph Klein laid off multitudes of nurses, and teachers. Many had to retire early, or leave Alberta. Imagine having to leave your family and your home behind, and relocate to another province, or to the United States, when you don’t want to. It is correct that these phony Conservatives and Reformers don’t create jobs, but they destroy them. They are good at lining the pockets of their rich friends. Ralph Klein’s attack on the public healthcare system in Alberta cost people their lives, and put other people’s lives at risk. There were lawsuits, but they were settled privately, because Ralph Klein didn’t make that public. I wonder how many lawsuits the UCP will face, for doing something similar to the public healthcare system in Alberta?
Anonymous My wife and I were in a restaurant in Leduc about a month after she was elected having lunch. There were 6 senior women at table near us and one began bragging about helping Smith get elected. They all admitted that they had helped her but three stated that they had, had second thoughts because they had received letters stating that their doctors were leaving because of how they had been treated by these fools. I had a hard time keeping from saying something to these women about how stupid they have been in electing them. I spent 24 years living and working in 10 rural Alberta towns with the Royal Bank and I still have a hard time understanding how ignorant they have shown themselves to be since I left. Klein was their absolute hero yet he did nothing to help them in any way.
Alan K. Spiller: I remember talking to some seniors once. They were mentioning suing the Alberta provincial government for the St. Joseph’s hospital incident in Vegreville, which affected their relatives. They said to me they still wouldn’t vote for the Liberals. They foolishly supported Ralph Klein to begin with, and he was a Liberal, turned into a Reformer. I heard that Peter Lougheed refused to appear with Ralph Klein in public, and it’s easy to understand why. Once, I recall reading about someone who wasn’t interested in getting into politics, but knew something had to be done to deal with these phony Conservatives and Reformers who were destroying what Peter Lougheed had given us. They were asked to become an MLA in the Wildrose party. As soon as they heard Danielle Smith give accolades to Ralph Klein, they smartly declined, because they had known Ralph Klein and his family for a very long time, and they knew he was bad. This person had also said that Don Getty told them that he regretted letting Ralph Klein join the Alberta PCs. Peter Lougheed also warned us about people like Danielle Smith, Stephen Harper and Preston Manning, because he knew they were no good. They were much like the Social Credit Party he defeated in 1971. In fact, during the 1960s, Preston Manning tried to convince Peter Lougheed’s fledgling Alberta PC party to merge with Ernest Manning’s Social Credit Party. Peter Lougheed was smart and declined. Danielle Smith is making another horrific mess, along with the UCP, and these seniors, and others who helped get them elected, will come to regret it. When you see comment sections in newspapers, such as the Edmonton Journal, the Edmonton Sun, The Calgary Herald and the Calgary Sun, people who speak out against these phony Conservatives and Reformers get nasty insults hurled at them. One person was called a communist. Danielle Smith makes all kinds of foolish claims. She has said she has Cherokee ancestry, and that’s been debunked. There are people who have Cherokee ancestry and they are able to prove it, with family records, photos, and even DNA test results. Danielle Smith also made erroneous claims of when her great grandfather left Ukraine for Canada. Imagine if someone has Cherokee ancestry, and has relatives who have Ukrainan ancestry. They likely wouldn’t think to highly of Danielle Smith.
Hello DJC and fellow commenters,
Health care will be chaos. Is it better to leave Alberta?
Wouldn’t the money be better spent on actual health care than on payouts for senior staff who are pushed out? And how much will the additional layers of bureaucracy and payments to members of the new councils cost?
Danielle Smith is everything you don’t want in a provincial premier.
Interesting list of people who were fired, especially when you look at the titles they had. Do hope the new appointees know what to do in their new jobs. Alberta voted for smith and company and now they’ll have to learn to live with it or die because of it. If Smith’s new boy wants citizens to pay for specific services, which many may not be able to afford, Alberta may find Ottawa will be reducing the amount of money sent to them for health care. Once upon a time some not so bright Socred in B.C. decided that to reduce the number of people going to ERs there would be a $10 for each visit. The Socreds took the position any one could afford $10. In the 1980s $10 bought enough for a decent dinner for your family. Once took a neighbour to the E.R. Staff asked for $10. They didnn’t have it with them. I paid, no problem, had a well paid job Eventually the P.M. got a tad pissed and started withholding money which would have been sent to B.C. It ran into the millions. yes that new $10 fee disappear quicly.
Given the rise in the cost of living there will any number of women who will not be able to afford Mamograms. By the time they are diagnosed with breast cancer, they may not be able to survive. Treating breast cancer is not cheap, so tin hat Smith and company are trying to save a few dollars so they can later spend thousands upon thousands. When the women die, it will be a drain on the community, families, etc. Nothing like a dead Mom to brighten up the neighbourhood, leaving children orphaned or with one parent unable to cope.
Charging for ultra sounds. Great idea, if you want more babies being born with health issues, babies who could have received medical treatment enutro. The U.S.A. has a very high rate of maternal deaths, pre delivery, during delivery and with a year of having given birth due to the lack of health care. That can have a dramatic effect on an economy. Once doctors start leaving, as they have done in some American states the problem compounds itself.
Yes, two great money saving ideas which has cost American women and children their lives and their families untolled grief adn of course all of it impact financial security.
When people start complaining their family members are dying, ask how they voted. Lets hope some one keeps a record of the deaths of the women, fetuses, and babies.
The average cost for a mamogram is approx. $150. It can run as high as $350 if it a more complex mammogram. $150, that is what some women have left to feed their kids in a month.
This will not end well.
Smith and her potential wrecking crew seem to be going down the if it isn’t broken, break it path in dealing with AHS. This sort of seems like UCP Deja vu.
When their last leader, Kenney ran for election, he tried to sound reassuring about dealing with health care. He said he was not going to cut spending. Then after the election, the other shoe seemed to drop, doctors contracts were unilaterally torn up and relations were not much better with other health care professionals.
This time Smith’s war seems to be with AHS itself or whatever remains after the UCP’s restructuring. I get the feeling there could be a lot of collateral damage from this latest UCP health care upheaval.
Despite their reassuring words at election time, there seems to be a pattern of later UCP meddling and upheaval that they seem unable to resist. This pattern seems to go back even further to past conservative governments, some remnants of which seem to have popped again in the UCP’s latest restructuring of AHS.
If there was any doubt for a while, the if it isn’t broken, break it gang seems back to business yet again.
So begins the Great Purge of Alberta. It seems like only yesterday that the TBA leader threatened to purge every school principal in the province. Lyle Oberg could be useful in that regard, too.
Unemployment isn’t just for renewable energy workers in Alberta. Somebody should call the feds. Alberta is trying to bankrupt the federal Employment Insurance plan. Crazy, but what isn’t these days?
Clever girl stacking one calamity on the other. Pensions, then dismantling health care and no doubt more are coming down the pike. Shock and awe. Klein did it and it was hugely successful. We will never be able to mount an effective opposition as the troops will be spread too thin. Another benefit of this tactic for Smith is no one is talking about the 400 children poisoned by E.coli due to the non existent oversight.
Why the NDP chose not to do this same thing but with positive changes is a mystery to me.
Was there an interview process for those leaving and those coming in to assess technical capacity or just around political affiliation? These sweeping changes in AHS and Banff Centre usually require a complex HR process and a lengthy time period – which is difficult to visualize happening. Who is providing this expertise or is just the chiefs of staff?
Who should determine the decisions? Herr Himmler, kommen Sie her! What a total _ _ _ t show? My apologies to the people possessing more brain cells than the entire UCP government that, were decapitated on a whim by a clown! Well? Here we go again! Dummy Dani, got to get her revenge! More will meet the UCP insane cleaver. Premier “Pork Barrel” isn’t done yet!
Ross, for a few decades now, the hiring and retention process in the Albaturda gov’t service is fairly straight forward.
The first page of qualifications has only 2 requirements, the next pages have the technical requirements. On page 1 are obedience and loyalty.
Most do not make it past that first page.
If they do, the hiring committee rarely looks any further.
In BC under the BC Liberals there were things like : why did a large BC Liberal donor,s company receive the contract for laundry privatization at Kelowna General hospital.
Prepare yourselves Alberta – it isn’t going to be nice.
Profit is a strong magnet.
Ayn Rand would be proud.
Oddly, they just finished up their series of “Townhall” meetings to get input from frontline healthcare professionals, but were ready to pull the trapdoor on leadership immediately. Almost as if the engagement was pure window dressing, (read with dripping sarcasm), like the faux engagement for the APP.
So the Gong Show continues with Reformers looking after Reformers and to hell with everyone else. Let’s hope they face massive Wrongful Dismissal lawsuits and they better not make them against the government, because that would be us, they better launch them against Smith, O’Berg and LaGrange.
I fully expect whatever AHS is called now will be taken over by some large consulting firm, likely a US HMO provider/manager. The $100 + M to reform AHS is just the beginning. There will be a massive transfer of budget resources soon enough. Hundreds of millions more? Billions more? It boggles the mind.
No matter. In other news today, it looks like the UCP will be partnering with Starlink to provide wireless highspeed internet to rural areas. $700 per terminal and $70 per month, the UCP are becoming really expensive. They are spending money on crazy shite. Of course, don’t tell rural Alberta public subsidized internet is a bad thing. How else are they going to get their social media feeds?
I hate Alberta and everyone in it.
Purely coincidental that the two areas of concern are along the U.S. border near Coutts. This is strangely specific. What goes on along the border in those two areas and at border crossings nearby?
https://globalnews.ca/news/10096922/alberta-starlink-pilot-program/
Surely such a scheme would not allow gun runners and drug traffickers to align themselves with their counterparts on the U.S. side of the border. I mean, it’s not like folks on the wrong side of the law would invest in tech to further their illegal ops.
https://www.reuters.comarticle/idUSKCN24G1DM/
https://www.justice.gov/archive/ndic/pubs31/31379/dtos.htm
What is broadband satellite instant messaging? No more ground stations? Communication with laser focus? How convenient. Is it just me, or is Alberta about to become a narco state? Surely the Montana sheriffs and highway patrol have it all under control.
Rural Alberta voters are entering the “find out” phase of their temper tantrums. Unfortunately, their utter lack of self awareness compels them to continue voting against their own interests and expecting different outcomes.
Cool Zenu:
I live in a Freedumb Convoy TBA rural riding. They love Danielle. They love what she’s doing. They love her ‘balls’. And they hate Trudeau.
Time may change this, especially if one of these decisions hits them personally. For now, they are blissfully unaware and empowered.
Does anyone know the background of the new board members appointed by Fraulein Schmidt? As in do they have any qualifications for their roles? I suppose my inner cynic must assume the main qualifications are: a) be a “friend” of The Party (financial donor and/or connected to private enterprise that will one day be awarded an untendered contract), and b) be an unwavering sycophant with unquestioned loyalty to The Party. Dark times, my friends….
Recall Bill 11 by Ralph Klein to privatize healthcare. He wanted evidence to support his Bill 11, that the private sector was more efficient than public sector. A review by academics from U of C of literature nationally and internationally did not support Ralph’s premise. He replaced the whole Executive Committee of Alberta Health (civil servants serving the public to provide evidence for policy) for not providing him the evidence he needed.
If you do not drink the same Kool-Aid, forget the evidence and truth, you are history! History is repeating itself.
I agree with the poster who says she is recreating a Ralph K. era. I was one of those nurses who had to fight to stay afloat during that time. I was one of those nurses who took early retirement when the Alberta conservatives hired Stephen Dukett. I am one of those nurses who now has to deal with Danielle Smith’s disaster. She will destroy our health care system. I’ve been a nurse for almost 50 years and am still employed part time by AHS (I won’t be for much longer, her new system will change my employer apparently). I have seen it all. Unfortunately folks seem to forget the disaster of the Klein years, how he sold Alberta for a balanced cheque book, liquor stores, registry offices, physio therapy clinics, long term care facilities and the list goes on. What’s next Danielle, oh I remember, now your getting rid of hospitals. (Covenant Health) What a great idea!!!!! (sarcasm) and getting rid of more long term care facilities, wonderful idea, (sarcasm again because we have the largest population over 65 the world has ever known). I hate to say it Alberta but you had another choice. But you chose Danielle. Unfortunately as a citizen and an employee and a healthcare professional, I pay the price, but wait, so do all of you.