This blog has been authored by the following physicians (in alphabetical order):
Dr. Paul Conte – former OMA Board member, former OMA Board Chair and former Chair of GNC during much of the transition to the new Governance Model
Dr. Sohail Gandhi – OMA Past-President who was tasked with giving the speech at Council leading to the governance transformation.
Drs. Paul Hacker and Lisa Salamon – Past Co-Chairs of the GT20 Governance Transformation Task Force that oversaw the governance changes
Dr. Jesse Wheeler – former member of the GT20
The five of us would like to encourage ALL Ontario physicians to attend the Ontario Medical Association’s (OMA) continuation of the Annual General Meeting on Tuesday, June 23rd at 6:30 PM. This meeting will be virtual. The OMA’s bylaws do not allow proxy votes, so you will need to be there virtually. A registration link is at the end of the blog.
We were heavily involved in the governance transformation that the OMA underwent starting in 2019. We attended many many meetings, reviewed many pieces of legislation and consulted widely before making our recommendations. All of us feel that much of the work we did is being undermined by the current OMA leadership.
It is true that many of the changes that have occurred have been very good for physicians. The move to a smaller Board that represents physicians as a whole was badly overdue. The previous Board was too unwieldy. Despite best efforts there was some element of trying to represent your constituency on the Board as opposed to the profession as a whole. The current smaller board size is ideal for a forward-thinking organization that will need to respond to unexpected threats that come out of the blue.
Additionally, we’re very pleased with the move away from Council and into the Priorities and Leadership Group (PLG). While OMA Council had many dedicated members who gave of their time to represent their colleagues and did a lot of unrecognized work, the very structure and nature of Council created a bit of a divisive environment. Instead of building consensus, Council often times was reduced to entrenched voting blocs. This was unhelpful.
Judging by feedback from the last two PLG meetings, this mentality seems to no longer exist, and there seems to be a genuine cooperative effort to come up with ideas and to prioritize them for the OMA to tackle. We’re very pleased that this has happened. This can only be a good thing for physicians going forward.
Unfortunately, however, we continue to have significant concerns about how the OMA has handled the issue of governance at the Board level, and in particular, how the OMA has, in our view, manipulated the process for physicians choosing Board Directors. Specifically, having non-physician Board Directors voting on matters that affect physicians has proven to be unhelpful.
Drs. Conte and Gandhi presented a motion at the AGM to remove non-physician directors. To be abundantly clear, we are not at all opposed to the idea of the board seeking out external expertise in areas as needed. It’s imperative that a member advocacy association does that. It’s a good thing, and in our best interest.
The issue is who makes decisions on behalf of physicians. We feel strongly that that should be physicians only. Only physicians have the lived in day to day experience in health care that will help determined whether external advice, however well intentioned, is actually good for other physicians. We are disappointed that the current OMA leadership is fighting us on this. We’re further disappointed at some of the tactics being used.
Last week, the OMA Board Chair released 12 findings of an independent review of issues around the first part of the AGM. We thank her for sharing that. Issues ranged from insufficient testing, to late registration challenges, to login difficulties, and so on. The majority of their recommendations are good supportable recommendations.
We are concerned at the recommendation for including templates for anticipated motions and procedural motions. One of the most frustrating aspects of the first part of the AGM was what we viewed as gamesmanship. The clear impression was the leaders of the OMA were trying to get a certain result, regardless of whether the members wanted it or not. We are concerned that by openly stating the need for procedural templates, attempts will once again be made by those few to bog down the meeting in procedural delays, instead of letting members debate the merits of the motions.
Furthermore, we have significant concerns about the legal opinion on the validity of the vote of the first motion at the annual general meeting. We are not questioning the background, or the knowledge, or the expertise of the external legal consultant Wayne Gray. Rather, it appears that his opinion is based on information provided by the OMA. That is worrisome.
Mr. Gray states that the number of votes on the first motion (to remove non-physician Board Directors) was 534. But there needed to be a revote and only 483 people voted the second time. Additionally he was told 79 people were unable to cast votes. Based on that, the first motion wouldn’t have passed. That is true, but that 79 number came from a survey done by Dr. Paul Hacker. The survey had limited reach. The OMA certainly didn’t survey all the members. That number also doesn’t include those who couldn’t register or those who couldn’t log in. In short, we really don’t know how many people would have voted had there been no technical issues.
We are left with the strong sense that had the first motion passed, the OMA would be trying much, much harder to hold a re-vote on the first motion to get the result they want.
Additionally, the OMA leadership is putting up videos opposing the member motions for attendees to view. We were notified on Friday that we could add a video supporting the motions. This gives us less than ten days, while the OMA has had weeks to put theirs together, and also has the resources to make their videos look more professional. (This reminds us of the days of the 2016 tPSA when the Board produced all sorts of promotional videos to promote a bad deal to the members). Additionally, there were NO videos supporting or opposing the motions for the first part of the AGM. This creates a fundamental inequity in how the two halves of the AGM are managed, and we don’t think that’s appropriate. We will NOT be doing videos.
Drs. Conte and Gandhi also have motions to prevent the OMA from providing commentary on candidates and removing arbitrary criteria for banning members from running for Board. Other physicians have motions about tax information being used by the OMA and strengthening Districts.
What can you do dear member? Well, the answer is simple. It will take some of your very valuable time (and we recognize that). We ask all of you to register for the continuation of the AGM. Important, you MUST register by 6:00 pm, Monday June 22. It is essential that you make your voices heard. YOU have control over the OMA and its direction, if and only if you choose to exercise your authority. We sincerely hope you will.
Click here to register for the AGM.
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