August 17, 2002

Health Ads

Government was willing to break a campaign promise in order to run its health ads. Should it now provide some criteria for evaluating its communication strategy? What is the message, and how will government's "public affairs bureau" determine whether anything was accomplished for $433,500? What was so important that government broke its promise? How will the communication goal be measured?

After spending $433,500 the Campbell government may find that 70% of people still believe (as they told Ipsos-Reid in May) that BC's health care system is in worse shape than is was under the previous government. That kind of poll result might suggest that the government could have kept its promise and spent the money on health care rather than on advertising.

Health Minister Collin Hansen has been busy on the talk show circuit. He has been saying that breaking their promise is justified in comparison to ad campaigns run by the former government. The Campbell liberals criticized those campaigns and were right to do so. No comparison can excuse their broken promise.

Listen to all five government ads from the website at http://www.healthservices.gov.bc.ca/bchealthcare/. They have one thing in common. All five have an ending that says "We're acting now so your health care system will be there for you today and in the future". That message plays on the one thing that government got out of the May Ipsos-Reid poll, the public belief that things will get better in the future. In other words, rather than informing the public, the ad campaign is designed to deliver the message "wait and things may get better in the future." The Liberal's message of short term pain for long term gain may set a goal that they cannot deliver. It would be far better to establish a process for change that involves the public.

The Liberals are failing in health care because their objective is purely a financial one. People understand higher MSP premiums, the loss of eyeglass, chiropractic, and other benefits. They know when their parents are being kicked out of residential care. Interior communities understand what it means when their hospital closes.

The Campbell government is imposing change rather than working with communities. They are willing to provide pay bonuses for the Health Authority CEOs and the Ministers of Health if they come within their budget, but there are no penalties if they do harm by increasing the infant death rate or by kicking seniors out of their homes.

The government caucus understands that many of them may pay the price on the next Election Day, May 17, 2005. No communications strategy will compensate for mean, unthinking, uncaring, financially motivated policies. The problem faced by the Campbell government is not communications.