The statesman in the snow: An afternoon with the father of Canadian medicare

He was waiting in the front window of the Saskatoon Club when I approached. My flight was late, it was snowing quite hard, and though I knew better, all of this was my fault.How could I keep him waiting?Former Supreme Court Justice Emmett Hall, the father of Canadian Medicare, could not have been nicer. He welcomed me into “the place to be” in Saskatoon, as we sat in the club’s restaurant for lunch.It was the week of his 93rd birthday. He ate slowly, and after his soup and sandwich, we retired to the library. It was something like you see in a movie. Oak paneling, leather, wing-backed chairs, books.By all accounts, the system at that time, the one that promised citizens of this country accessible, comprehensive, portable, universal and publicly administered healthcare was crumbling.He seemed unfazed, confident in the morality and ethics of Canadians, he called it their “value system,” as it offered egalitarianism and natural justice of the system.“Because of the tremendous size of this country, there are bound to be some areas where there are problems,” he said.“The profession has made a good effort despite enormous obstacles. . . . Queues occur not only in the medical field but other professions as well, you know, and I don’t know that’s it’s necessarily true that there are many who die waiting for a doctor.”In 1964, Mr. Justice Hall chaired the Royal Commission on Health Care Services, which laid the groundwork for public medicare by recommending a national health policy and a comprehensive healthcare program, the Medicare Act of 1966, another commission on Canada's National-Provincial Health Program (1980), the Canada Health Act of 1984 and the Royal Commission on the Future of Health Care in Canada (2002), led by former Saskatchewan Premier Roy Romanow.But almost all of it didn’t happen, Justice Hall told me.It was a cold day in January of 1961 when he got a call from the prime minister and former classmate John Diefenbaker, who told him the Canadian Medical Association was urging he appoint a commission to study the whole health field.The two spoke for several minutes with the prime minister saying he might call again.Come lunch time, he hurried across the street to the Assiniboia Club.“Just as I entered the dining room, I heard over the loudspeaker that I had been appointed chairman of a commission to do a full study into healthcare in Canada.“The next thing was a call from my wife. She wanted to know why I hadn’t told her of my impending appointment. All I could say was that she had heard the news as I had. I was as surprised as she was.”The late Doug Geekie, the CMA’s long-time director of communications and government affairs had no experience with a major royal commission up to that time. He was going to get a surprise.“To some degree, I feel Hall had made up his mind even before the hearings started,” Geekie told the Medical Post in 1992, “but he looked hard at the issues, and no one could question his integrity and motivation to do the best job possible. He gave everybody every opportunity to have their say.”Justice Hall warned, however, that governments and physicians have their marching orders.Governments “must find ways of keeping budgets in line,” he noted. “Canadians may have to incur higher levels of taxes (to keep medicare alive) or pay new forms of tax,” while “private corporations too have to contribute their full share of the burden.“The profession cannot be allowed to be a law unto itself, nor has the state the right to conscript the service of physicians.”This kind of personality and experience and drive makes the judge eminently qualified to judge his fellow citizens, don’t you think?“I think I know what Canadians want and will have when it comes to healthcare,” he said.“No government in Canada that sets out to discontinue medicare will survive,” he added. “Canadians will not put up with anything of the kind . . . (but) we have to ensure there is no waste in the system.”Walking back to my hotel in the accumulating snow, I remember thinking how significant the interview had been for me personally. In the restaurant, Justice Hall was a frail, elderly man of 93. In the library, he was the iconic statesman he will always be.Matt Borsellino was national editor of the Medical Post for many years.

The statesman in the snow: An afternoon with the father of Canadian medicare

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