Address family doctor shortage
Petitioners ask the House of Commons to work with provinces and territories to create a holistic, fair plan to reduce Canada's family doctor shortage and improve primary-care access. The government responds it will collaborate with provinces and territories to bolster the health workforce, speed foreign credential recognition, and support team-based primary care.
Why we would sign this petition
- Federal-provincial-territorial collaboration could align policies and resources across jurisdictions to increase and better distribute primary-care providers.
- A holistic, fair plan aimed at family doctor shortages could shorten wait times and improve access for rural and underserved communities.
- Committing to comprehensive solutions would enable workforce planning and the adoption of broader primary-care models to expand timely care.
Why we wouldn’t sign this petition
- Healthcare workforce management is mainly a provincial/territorial responsibility, so federal-led efforts may have limited authority or effect.
- Achieving a pan-Canadian solution could be costly and slow, competing with other health priorities and budget constraints.
- The petition is broad and lacks specific measures, so it may yield vague commitments rather than effective, targeted actions.
The summary and both sets of reasons are AI-generated from the petition and given equal weight. Claims are the petitioners’ own; consult the official record for the full text.
Official petition
PETITION TO THE HOUSE OF COMMONS IN PARLIAMENT ASSEMBLED Whereas: Statistics Canada cites that approximately 4.8 million Canadians do not have a regular doctor; Despite the number of physicians in Canada growing, the number of Canadians without a regular doctor remains stable; 92 per cent of physicians work in urban centres, while just 8 per cent work in rural areas; and, In Victoria and Sidney, B.C., average wait time for a walk-in clinic are 92 and 180 minutes respectively, We, the undersigned citizens and residents of Canada call upon the House of Commons in Parliament assembled to: Work with all the provinces and territories in Canada to come to a holistic and fair solution to Canada's family doctor shortage
Government response
Response by the Minister of Health Signed by Maggie Chi Primary care is the backbone of high-performing health care, serving as Canadians’ first point of contact with the system and playing a critical role in the delivery of health services. We understand that some Canadians still struggle to secure timely access to a regular primary care provider, whether it is from a doctor, nurse practitioner, or team. Pre-existing challenges facing the health workforce were exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic where health care workers bore the brunt of the extreme pressures on the health system, leading to significant levels of stress and burnout, including among primary care providers. These persistent challenges are impacting the care that Canadians receive. While the responsibility for the management of the health workforce falls within provincial and territorial (PT) jurisdiction, the federal government understands that it has a key leadership role to play in supporting solutions to the challenges facing health systems across the country. We are committed to working with provincial and territorial governments to protect and strengthen the publicly funded health care system. On October 17, 2025, federal, provincial and territorial (FPT) Health Ministers met to discuss strengthening the health and well-being of Canadians. Ministers recognized the urgent need to grow and sustain Canada’s health workforce and committed to urgently advancing solutions and removing barriers by engaging with respective immigration counterparts to improve pathways for internationally educated health professionals, accelerating foreign credential recognition, and working with Canadian regulators to adopt mutual licence-recognition models to enhance labour mobility for physicians, nurses, and health professionals across Canada. Our new government is committed to enabling supportive, sustainable environments where health workers can thrive. Recognizing that the conditions of work are the conditions of care, we are advancing efforts focused on retention, workforce planning, and ethical recruitment. Through partnerships and convening, we are building consensus and mobilizing evidence to strengthen Canada’s health workforce and advance innovative models of primary care. For example, our Government is: Supporting the dissemination and implementation of the “Nursing Retention Toolkit: Improving the Working Lives of Nurses in Canada”. Funding Healthcare Excellence Canada, which recently launched its Care Forward initiative, including a Primary Care Access Improvement program. This program helps organizations optimize how primary care teams function so they can provide timely access to care for more people. Published a federal-provincial-territorial (FPT)-endorsed study of the education and training supply and demand for select health care professions, including family physicians, to identify the best pan-Canadian approaches to meet future health care demands for Canadians over the next decade. Funding Health Workforce Canada, which is leading pan-Canadian collaboration on improving health workforce data collection, analysis, and knowledge mobilization to inform planning. Convening key primary care partners, researchers, PTs, experts, and other government departments to drive data and evidence, build consensus, and enable knowledge mobilization on topics such as primary care delivery models, virtual care, nursing, and education and training. The Canada Health Act Services Policy, which comes into effect on April 1, 2026, will further encourage team-based care. The Policy clarifies that patients should not face charges for medically necessary services when provided by a regulated health care provider, if these same services are otherwise covered by a PT health insurance plan when provided by a physician. It recognizes the value of fully integrating nurse practitioners into the health care system and their critical role in responding to the primary care gap for people in Canada without access to a primary care provider. Our new Government is building on work carried out by the previous government that includes important budget commitments in 2023 and 2024. These commitments include investments that expand access to family health services, reduce backlogs, improve access to quality mental health care, and strengthen training opportunities and accelerate workforce integration for internationally-educated health professionals.