The Tribune

By DANA SMITH

Tribune Staff Reporter

dsmith@tribunemedia.net

THE government’s plan to create a steering committee to oversee the implementation of National Health Insurance only proves the Christie administration is “a bridge to the past”, said Hubert Minnis.

Minnis, a former Health Minister, said industry professionals already told the PLP, during their last term in office, that implementing National Health Insurance would be “cost prohibitive”.

He questioned why the government would once again plan to introduce the insurance, in the present financial times.

Dr Minnis was responding to Health Minister Perry Gomez’s remarks in the House of Assembly on Wednesday.

Dr Gomez said health does not receive enough of the national budget to “meet all the health care needs for many of the neediest in our communities”. He said implementing national health insurance would provide “equitable access to quality health care” for Bahamians and would create an exclusive health insurance fund.

He proposed the establishment of a 12-member steering committee to oversee the implementation with three sub-committees as support.

Dr Minnis said the Prime Minister and his administration were “going back to the past where you have committees viewing things and then another committee has to be established to review the report of this committee.”

He said the Prime Minister “governed by committee” during the PLP’s last term from 2002 to 2007.

“And he’s back to committee,” Dr Minnis added. “He’s hiring all these retirees and pensioners... They’re going back to their old selves. He’s not a bridge to the future, he’s a bridge to the past.”

Dr Minnis said the government had promised to establish National Health Insurance within the first year of their governance but “they didn’t do it.”

“They sold the Bahamian people a pack of dreams, nothing of which materialized. Now, they come with this national health - because they know that there are challenges within the health sector - and they come with this so as to cover up all the missteps they had during the first year,” he said.

But, National Health Insurance was already reviewed by international and national health organisations who had informed the government of the problems and challenges implementing a programme, would present, Dr Minnis said.

“When the country was in a better financial state, they had all the national and international reports that they couldn’t do it. It was cost prohibitive at that particular time. Now, they are talking about National Health Insurance at a time where they knew what the challenges were when we had money flowing through the system,” he said.

“Now we’re in a recessionary period, unemployment is high and they’re going to talk about bringing something what couldn’t work when we had money.”

The government is just “selling dreams, again,” Dr Minnis said.

“They sold us dreams during the election, Bahamians have bought it, (but) Bahamians are now awake. (The Christie Administration) still thinks they are campaigning and they’re still trying to sell dreams. They must now awaken and start to govern.”

Asked if he thinks the government should abandoned their plan to implement National Health Insurance, the Opposition Leader said the government should look at what the FNM had been doing and see how beneficial it was to the Bahamian people.

“Whatever changes or adjustments or whatever they want to do, proceed,” he said.

National Health Insurance was developed under the first Christie administration. A 15-member Blue Ribbon Commission was appointed to review the feasibility of a national health insurance plan.

The National Health Insurance Act was tabled in Parliament by the Christie government on November 2006 and partially implemented in 2010, under the former Ingraham administration.