There were bitter disputes over whether new money was really new, or whether it had to be new new money . What was an agreement to the Prime Minister was merely an "arrangement" to the premiers, with Ralph Klein going so far as to point out that none of them had actually signed the document, whatever that meant. At the end, the three territorial leaders walked out, refusing to agree to what the other First Ministers had not agreed to or to sign what the others had not signed.

This was taken as a matter of great significance.

And through it all, the press persisted in treating the whole affair as if it were a sort of labour negotiation, full of hard bargaining and salty language. But if this was a negotiation, what, exactly, did the provinces bring to the table? Negotiation means I offer something to you, like money, and you offer something to me in return, like goods or services.

The only issue in these "negotiations" was whether the provinces would deign to accept the transfer of billions of dollars in free money from the feds, or whether they would hold out for more.

Naturally, they decided to do both. The $35-billion over five years that Ottawa was promising to pump into health care was "a good start," an "important first step." But in a couple of years, they vowed, they'd be back. (Yes, yes, I know, about $8-billion of that was already pledged, as part of the $23-billion package "negotiated" back in 2000. Are the feds guilty of "double counting"? Maybe so. But since the provinces never even counted it once -- like the transfer of tax points back in the 1970s, it was simply added to provincial baselines, without acknowledgement -- that seems only fair.)

Well, I'm oversimplifying. There is one thing the provinces brought to the table: their capacity to make life miserable for the feds. Though all sides claimed to want to "end the finger-pointing," the fact is that in any such battle of the buckpassers, the premiers have it all over the PM.

They are 10 (all right, 13) to Ottawa's one, and accomplished beggars.

All they have to do is squawk in unison to leave the public with an impression of some unpleasantness, owing to Ottawa's failure to act in the spirit of "co-operative federalism," i.e., give us everything we ask for, plus everything we were going to ask for next.

Which makes it something of an achievement for Jean Chretien to have held them to so little. Understand: The controversy is not about how much the federal government is willing to put into health care.

However you want to count it, it's a great big wad of dough. But of that $35-billion, barely $4-billion came in the form the provinces were after: fresh cash, preferably in unmarked bills, to spend how they liked.

The rest was either old money, money the feds would get to spend, or money with all sorts of strings attached.

This is very good news. The last thing the health care system needs, as it is currently structured, is more money. Not only does it not help -- that $23-billion vanished without a trace, most of it into the pockets of health care providers -- but it arguably hurts. The impetus for reform was greatest in the "era of cuts," the mid-1990s, when real per capita spending on health care plunged to levels not seen since the late 1980s.

As soon as the spigots were opened again -- we're back to all-time record highs, even before this latest injection -- the incentive for governments to undertake difficult and far-reaching reforms, or for providers to accept them, ceased.

Of course, set against that concern is the fact that, in all likelihood, any new money "for health" will be spent on everything but health. You can call it the Canadian Health Transfer if you like, but it all goes into general revenues. The provinces will spend whatever it takes on health to keep the media off their backs, and would have no matter what the feds had given them. It follows that whatever fresh transfusions of cash they receive from Ottawa will go to other things, like schools, or tax cuts.

If it is impossible to force the provinces to spend federal cash on certain things, it is possible all the same to prevent them from spending it on others. This is the great virtue of the segregated $16-billion Health Reform Fund. The programs to be underwritten by the fund -- home care, catastrophic drug coverage and so on -- are all very well. But the principal benefit of earmarking funds in this way is to keep the doctors and the nurses and the hospital workers from getting their mitts on it.

Thirty-five billion dollars of your money and mine, and only about a third of it wasted. The Prime Minister deserves our thanks.