I love local politics.
Local politics are so…boring, usually. All-candidate forums are usually people standing up and saying “I like what she said,” or “He’s got great ideas.”
There’s none of this yelling at people, none of this trying to show that you’re more a part of the in group that you belong to by focusing on the tiniest little differences between you and the opposition to rally people to your side, even though—like Coke and Pepsi—you are at heart just battery acid with a pound of sugar added.
Okay, spoiler warning, this editorial was written on Monday, before the all-candidates forum happened, so for all I know, there could have been a punching match break out between the candidates.
But I doubt it. Because it’s local politics. It’s boring, and I love it.
These people are not setting the course for health care on a national level, they are struggling with the implications of what the Federal and Provincial governments have done in setting the course of health care. Trying to find a way to attract one more nurse, one more doctor, while local governments across the province try and do the same thing.
It feels a little bit like fighting over scraps. Not that the quality of medical professionals we get is less, just that there are so few students graduating in medical related fields and, of those graduates, fewer and fewer want to get into family medicine.
According to research published earlier this year, less than a third of medical students—30.7 percent—ranked family medicine as their top choice.
Last year, that number was 31.4 percent, and in 2015, it was 38 percent.
That means that any student looking to get into family practice has their choice of jobs.
And sure, some of those graduates might want to get into a practice that brings them to a sleepy town in northern BC, but I’m going out on a limb and saying that most of them will prefer to work in slightly bigger centres, slightly farther south.
Most students graduating in medical related fields these days are getting into specialized medicine.
Family doctors are basically their own boss, working on a fee-for-service model. While some doctors appreciate this ability to be independent, many prefer to work directly in the hospital, where they can get paid more and not have to deal with the hassle of running their own business.
According to the BC College of Family Physicians, a typical family doctor makes about $258,869 a year for 2,000 to 2,500 hours of work and 1,500 to 2,000 patients.
That’s pretty good, until you factor in that they have to pay employees, rent, equipment. After all that, they make an average of $168,265. That sounds pretty good, but a nurse practitioner makes about $150,000 annually, with 300 to 500 patients.
Meanwhile, if they were to work in a hospital, they would make an average of $285,600 working just 1,680 hours a year.
And I don’t care how passionate a doctor is about their patients, that isn’t a real strong incentive to get out there and start running your own family practice. Work longer, get paid less, suffer more burnout….
And over the next decade, nearly half the existing family doctors are expected to retire.
This means that already there are close to a million people—in BC alone—without a family doctor, and that number is just going to grow, meaning demand for family physicians is going to grow, too.
And this is just one issue that people running for municipal government have to face. There are more. We are facing a similar shortage in the number of childcare workers in town. With no one to look after their kids, some people have decided to leave. Some have had to stop working.
More pressing to Tumbler Ridge is we are facing a slowly aging infrastructure, which was all built at basically the same time, meaning it all needs to be repaired or replaced at the same time.
I’ve been doing this long enough to see a long list of fresh-faced, innocent locals—passionate about this community and convinced they can do a better job than the previous guy—get voted in on a platform of “I will work hard for this community, I will work hard for you, and I will make changes,” only to discover that they are handcuffed by laws that govern what they can and cannot do as a local politician and trying to get more money and services out of the same Federal and Provincial sources that every other municipality in the province is trying to get money from, faced with the same off-loading of services onto the District’s shoulders that the previous council has faced.
It’s not an easy job, and trying to change course can be like trying to steer an oil tanker; changes in direction made on a policy level now can take years to take effect.
Meanwhile, as they are trying to steer the ship so it doesn’t run aground, the passengers on the ship (yes, there are passengers on the oil tanker; I never said this was the most logical metaphor; just roll with it) are throwing rocks and bricks through the windows of the wheelhouse. It is a mostly thankless job, where, if you do it right, the best you can hope for is people to ignore you. At worst, people will call you names and call you down and insult you and make fun of you.
You may notice that of the previous council, only two people are returning. That should be interpreted as a portent.
So I wish those new candidates who get elected luck and skill and thick skin.
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
