On Monday, the Official Opposition raised the relationship the provincial government has with former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s company, after their freedom of information request only generated a heavily redacted contract.
Tuesday the NDP told MLAs in question period that the contracts they requested regarding another Alberta company also came back with the information redacted. This company provides private surgeries in Saskatchewan and is also a Sask. Party donor. NDP Leader Carla Beck says Canadian Surgical Solutions donated over $14,000 to the Sask. Party through a subsidiary. The company has contracts for knee and hip procedures and for mammograms for Saskatchewan residents, all being performed in Calgary.
Beck says the government redacted the sections of the contracts which would list the costs for each procedure and any extra fees. Health Critic Vicki Mowat doesn’t believe this information should be considered commercially sensitive, because these are special sole-source deals without any competition.
Meanwhile the Government of Saskatchewan on Tuesday was touting the number of surgeries performed in 2023-24 saying the total of 95,700 was a record and six thousand more than the previous year.
Wait times more than six months are said to be nearly 25 percent lower for the time it takes between seeing a specialist and getting the surgery. The provincial government says about 15 percent of the surgeries were delivered outside the public system.
2023 Canadian Surgical Solutions for Out of Province Hip Knee
