Province, docs reach deal

Job action by B.C. doctors may have been averted by a tentative agreement announced Tuesday by the provincial government and B.C. Medical Association.

The new memorandum of understanding, which sets out doctors' fee payments and a process to resolve other issues still in dispute, means the association has called off its job action plans announced last week.

"All of us want to work together to put patients first," Premier Gordon Campbell said in a release. "This memorandum of understanding we have signed will allow us to do just that."

The association has called off its province-wide doctors' refusal of committee work, and warnings that service withdrawals would increase if no agreement was reached by April 1.