Family doctors vote overwhelmingly in favour of agreement with Quebec

Quebec’s family doctors have voted overwhelmingly in favour of an agreement that will incentivize them to take on an additional 500,000 patients by next June.

The vote on Friday comes after a lengthy negotiation between the doctors and the Coalition Avenir Québec goverment, who had pushed through controversial legislation, known as Bill 2, that would have, among other things, tied part of doctors’ pay to performance indicators. 

The law sparked backlash from doctors with many family physicians and clinics threatening to close entirely if the legislation was not amended. 

Earlier this month, Premier François Legault stepped in to negotiate with the doctor’s union, reaching a tentative agreement that rolled back many of the major measures in Bill 2.

The new deal eliminated a controversial plan to assign patients on a colour-coded system based on their level of vulnerability, and removed all articles in the legislation that would have penalized doctors for not following the reforms.

The deal also removed the obligation for family doctor groups, known in French as GMFs, to take on the province’s estimated 1.2 million orphaned patients by January 2027. Instead, the deal says the doctors will take on 500,000 new patients by June on a voluntary basis, but won’t face penalties if those goals aren’t reached.

The union that represents family doctors, the Fédération des médecins omnipraticiens du Québec (FMOQ), said in a statement that the agreement is a “clear commitment to transforming frontline care.”

“Among other things, the agreement will change the remuneration model, improve funding for telemedicine, and stabilize clinics that depend on the GMF program,” the statement said.

“Family physicians will be able to continue practicing high-quality family medicine and focus on what they do best: caring for patients in Quebec.”