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Auditor general to review new hospital deal
Friday February 8 2008
- Brampton Guardian
Repeated calls for an independent audit on the private financing scheme used to build Brampton Civic Hospital have been answered.
Provincial auditor general Jim McCarter confirmed Friday his office will conduct a thorough review of BCH, the first hospital in Ontario built under a public-private partnership model (P3).
The decision to place the new, state-of-the-art facility under the microscope comes amid accusations of massive cost overruns and poor patient care.
A final report on the hospital is slated for release later this year.
"This (hospital) was a major expenditure and so we have decided to look at this area," McCarter told The Guardian. "We are looking at the whole financing model, the whole infrastructure."
McCarter said his office has already initiated the audit process with the Ministry of Health and William Osler Health Centre.
Investigators will collect details of the deal and compare the experiences at BCH with P3 projects in other jurisdictions.
McCarter stressed his office will only look at this matter in terms of financing, and not from a service delivery standpoint.
The objective here is to determine whether Bramptonians got the best bang for their buck, McCarter said.
"And where we feel we can make recommendations to improve the process, we would make those recommendations," said McCarter noting the report will also strive to point out where exactly the $800 million spent on the facility went.
Shedding more light on the deal is a welcomed move for opponents of P3, who charge the financing model is a threat to public health care in Canada.
The Ontario Health Coalition has used information obtained after a four-year court battle to show BCH came two years late and about $300 million over budget.
When the project was first proposed, the building's price tag was hovering at about $350 million (capital costs) and included a much larger floor plan.
The facility was also supposed to boost the patient bed count to 720, an amount split between 608 at the new hospital and 112 beds at Peel Memorial.
Instead, the public got a building that is much smaller, has far fewer beds (479), and worth around $800 million.
Under the P3 deal, the consortium of companies involved in the building of BCH will control non-medical services such as portering, parking, food and housekeeping for the next 25 years.
During that time the public will buy back the building.
The Brampton public is currently on the hook for 30 per cent of the total cost of the facility.
About 200 people gathered at the Lester B. Pearson Theatre in Bramalea Thursday night where a panel comprised of Ontario Health Coalition members, politicians and lawyers spoke about hospital services in Brampton.
The purpose of the meeting was to present information regarding the redevelopment of Peel Memorial Hospital and, with respect to BCH, hammer home the message that health care must remain a strictly public venture.
Natalie Mehra, director of the Ontario Health Coalition, argued the consortium stands to make "exorbitant" profits of $260 million on a hospital initially valued at $350 million.
McCarter said a report on the financing of BCH will be one of 12 to 15 value-for-money audits presented in an annual report to Queen's Park.
That report is typically released in December.
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