Skwxwú7mesh Úxwumixw TERRITORY / SQUAMISH, B.C. — Leader of the BC Greens and candidate for Saanich North and the Islands was joined by BC Greens MLA for West Vancouver-Sea to Sky, Jeremy Valeriote, to announce the BC Greens’ plan to reform B.C.’s healthcare system.
“One in every eleven dollars spent in this province is government healthcare spending,” said Lowan. “Yet people are getting sicker and conditions for workers are deteriorating, all as we watch millions of dollars flow to private healthcare providers.
“The BC Greens are the only party vowing to end the creeping privatization of healthcare. Instead, we’ll keep public dollars focused on public care through delivering Community Health Centres (CHCs) and cutting down on bloated bureaucracy.”
There has been a 270% increase in administrative costs in the healthcare sector since 2017, up to $3.8B.
“In 2025, the BC Greens worked with the NDP to review primary care,” said Lowan, “all evidence showed that the CHC model, with the right supports, can offer the excellence in healthcare British Columbians deserve. Since then, the BC NDP has regressed on healthcare, to the point of forcing nurses onto the picket line. Meanwhile, the Conservatives are promising to keep healthcare spending flat, effectively a cut as costs rise with inflation.”
“The levels of stress, moral injury and unsafe working conditions are pushing people out of the sector. We hear daily about nurses who are routinely working under unsafe staffing conditions, facing forced overtime, and denied time off. Health workers across the system are grappling with the emotional toll of being unable to provide the level of care their patients deserve. While the focus of the Government is on recruitment, retaining the nurses already in the system must become a much higher priority,” added MLA Jeremy Valeriote. “Between Eby’s broken promises and a Conservative plan that would only make these problems worse, British Columbians deserve to believe in a better future for their health care. That’s exactly what the BC Greens are committed to delivering.”
The announcement included:
- Establishment of an integrated Community Health Centre in every riding in the province.
- Increased funding for nurses in the public system to support safe nurse-to-patient ratios and end reliance on private agency nurses.
- Centralise referrals for surgeries and team-based models of non-surgical and pre-surgical care by introducing a single-entry model, rather than distributed lists.
Click here to read our full Healthcare Policy Brief.
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Prym Goodacre, Media & Campaigns Officer
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