Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And to my colleagues, MLAs, thank you very, very much. I wish to introduce a bill to amend the Medical Care Act. The proposed amendments will bring the act into line with the general Canadian practice of permitting alternative forms of payment to physicians. The Medical Care Act provides coverage of all physician services which are listed in its regulations. However, the act provides for only fee-for-service payments to physicians.
The proposed amendments would facilitate alternative forms of payments to physicians, and thus recognize activities and services which are not suited to fee-for-service. Alternative payments would generally involve contracts with individual physicians or groups of physicians and where such a contract affects medical services to residents of an area served by a regional health board, the health board's approval must and will be obtained before the contract is entered into. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.