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One of the founding fathers of Quebec’s health care system says Gaétan Barrette’s reforms are a spectacular failure that damaged an already ailing health network.

“Eventually we’re going to have to fix everything that Dr. Barrette has done,” said former health minister Claude Castonguay.

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Hospital emergency rooms are still overcrowded, delays for medical services are long and there’s no improvement to the network’s costs, Castonguay told the Montreal Gazette.

Barrette established a health network that resembles a system imposed by a single-party, eastern European country where all decisions are hyper-centralized, Castonguay said.

His criticism adds to a crescendo of grievances patient groups, health unions’ leaders, doctors’ associations and hospital administrators unveiled this week.

“It’s a total failure,” Castonguay said. “Because it’s impossible for the minister to manage the entire health system all by himself.”