Ontario doctors are being urged to take out their anger at the provincial government by voting against the federal Liberals on Oct. 19.

“Because Kathleen Wynne is campaigning so vigorously for the federal Liberals, it’s fair to express our displeasure about her policies in the federal election,” Dr. Scott Wooder, former president of the Ontario Medical Association, said Friday.

Doctors are furious, not just because their fees are being cut by 1.3 per cent, effective next Thursday, but because of the “contemptuous” treatment of the profession by the government, said the Stoney Creek family physician.

“It is a bullying relationship when there is that big of a power imbalance and a powerful party feels free to do what it wants.”

He has written a blog post, titled Make Them Pay at the Ballot Box, that is getting a lot of mileage on Twitter among physicians.

The province acted unilaterally with the most recent round of cuts to doctors’ fees as well as in January when it cut their fees by 2.65 per cent. The January move came after a year of contract negotiations resulted in an impasse.

At the time, the government warned it would cut fees further if doctors billed OHIP too much, too quickly depleting the $11.6 billion-budget set aside for physician services for the fiscal year.

The government insists doctors had a say in process that resulted in the cuts. During 2012 contract talks, the OMA agreed to a framework for future negotiations that allowed the government to take unilateral steps if talks went nowhere.

The government contends Ontario doctors are among the best paid in the world with average annual compensation of $350,000, out of which they pay overhead costs such as rent and staff salaries.

Their average annual compensation jumped 61 per cent between 2003 and 2013, the government points out. This includes payments through fee-for-service billings to OHIP, salary and capitation, a model that sees doctors get a set amount of money for each patients rostered.

Dr. Kevin Smith, who co-chaired the government’s negotiating team during last year’s talks, said the two sides “are more united than divided.”

There was much agreement during negotiations over where the two sides need to work together to fix such problems as the siloed structure of the health system, excessive paperwork, and shortcomings in primary care and home care, said Smith, president of St. Joseph’s Health System Hamilton and CEO of the Niagara Health System.

“In being among the best paid in the world, we should be among the highest performing. But at the moment, the funder is saying it has a lot of data showing we’re not. We have to get more value out of the system,” Smith said.

Dr. Michael Toth, current president of the 28,000-member OMA, said doctors would like to resume contract talks with government and negotiate a payment scheme both sides could agree on, as well as tackle problems in the health system. And if talks again end in an impasse, doctors want binding mediation-arbitration.

“We do want to work together with the government. We do want to get a physician services agreement because we know that we need to work with our partners in the system . . . . We know there is more work to be done,” he said.

Toth sent Health Minister Eric Hoskins a letter more than a week ago seeking a meeting, but has not heard back.

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But in an interview on Thursday, Hoskins said ministry officials are in ongoing contact with OMA representatives. Asked if he would be open to the idea of going back to the bargaining table to amend the current compensation scheme, Hoskins responded: “We are always happy to have discussions with the OMA.”

He was critical of the doctors for declining to help the province with efforts to reform primary care and increase access to in vitro fertilization.

Hoskins said the doctors have also refused to move forward with the creation of a task force to look at the best way to compensate doctors. The task force was recommendation by Ontario’s former chief justice, Warren Winkler, who served as a conciliator during last year’s failed negotiations.

“We have asked the OMA to create this (roundtable) and they have not been willing to move forward on that important issue . . . . We have been trying to engage the OMA but they have not been willing to provide us with their good advice,” Hoskins said.