STEVE SHARRATT
The Guardian
GEORGETOWN — Mayor Peter Llewellyn wants the minister of health to resign after breaking what he says was a commitment that would have allowed an Island doctor to work out of the Kings County capital.
Peter Llewellyn, Mayor of Georgetown
The town secured a bank loan to build a medical centre, found land for the project and had a tentative contract with a pharmacy to locate in the community.
Llewellyn said he even had tacit approval from the Health Department, but it was all contingent on the hiring of Dr. Soha Rizk, who lives in Fortune and whose husband is a doctor in Souris.
Cabinet aide Danny Walker and Leanne Sayle, director of health primary care, weren’t the bearers of good news here Monday.
“I know it’s disappointing, but it’s not the end of the story,” Sayle told the mayor in a meeting at the town hall. “There has been another candidate chosen for the Montague position.”
In the rejection letter, Minister Doug Currie said there is “a reluctance to entertain this (medical centre in Georgetown) based on a desire to develop the family health centre in the new building in Montague where all physicians will be co-located with other professionals.”
But Llewellyn said the government is not only ignoring its rural development cause, but actively campaigned during the last election that it would promote physician services in Georgetown.
“I’m not crying sour grapes, but the minister doesn’t have a click or a clue what is going on in this case,” said the mayor. “He’s a great guy, but he’s not making the decisions, it’s his department telling him what to do. I have an e-mail in which he tells me that he’s all for our plan, but Leanne Sayle runs the big picture.”
Llewellyn said the town has been working to bring a doctor to Georgetown (while serving duties at the Kings County Memorial hospital) for almost two years. He contends the provincial doctor recruitment team has spent thousands of dollars searching as far as Texas and completely ignored Rizk, who was completing her training on the Island and finishing up a maternity leave.
“The minister has abdicated his role and I have grave concerns about this government’s ability to lead and manage the P.E.I. bureaucracy.”
Sayle confirmed that a vacancy would likely be found for Rizk, but Llewellyn questioned why she would be qualified to end up working in Souris and not Georgetown.
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