REGINA - The birthplace of medicare could see more private delivery of health services as the Saskatchewan government tries to tackle a backlog in surgeries.

Premier Brad Wall says the legislative session, which starts Wednesday with a throne speech, will focus on improving health care, and that means looking at different ways to cut wait times.

However, the premier stressed Tuesday that health care will remain a publicly funded system in Saskatchewan.

"We are going to put patients ahead of philosophy," said Wall.

"We're going to have a public system and a single-user pay system in this province. But in terms of who provides it, I'm not so much concerned with that as I am with timely surgery."

The Saskatchewan Surgical Care Network, which tracks all patients needing surgery in the province, says on its website that there were 27,589 waiting for procedures as of June 2009. The website says 20 per cent of those people have been waiting four to 12 months.

Wall said those numbers need to change and the throne speech will unveil targets to deal with wait times.

"I want to see a Saskatchewan where you don't wait so long for your turn for an important surgery," said Wall.

"If it takes a private clinic, maybe on an itinerant basis, if it doctors coming in from private clinics to get the job done, if it takes using regional facilities, regional operating theatres where they can get the job done, then we're prepared to look at all of those options."

The government would also consider sending people to British Columbia for things such as orthopedic surgery, said Wall.

He said Premier Gordon Campbell has indicated that B.C. has capacity and fairly short wait times in that area.

"Is that an option for us? Yes," Wall said. "If people have been waiting for 15 months, do they care if (their surgery) happens in Saskatoon, Regina or Surrey? I'm not sure they do."

Opposition NDP Leader Dwain Lingenfelter agreed that health care will be high on the agenda during the fall session because the public is concerned about wait times.

But Lingenfelter said he doesn't think the option of adding more private delivery to the system will go over well with Saskatchewan residents.

"Privatization isn't the way Saskatchewan people want to go," said Lingenfelter.

"So if he's saying we're going to privatize health care in order to reduce waiting lists, I think the public will be even more grumpy with the premier ... because that's not what they want or expect."

Lingenfelter suggested privatizing clinics or hospitals would be costly to taxpayers and lower the quality of service. Using public dollars to pay for services at a private clinic is still privatization of health care, he argued.

Wall insisted there's a philosophical difference.

"It's not a private pay, there won't be that option. It's a single payer system," said Wall. "It's just more capacity that will shorten the waiting lists so no, you wouldn't have that option to jump any queues."

While health care is expected to dominate the session, politicians are also expected to discuss the province's finances. The Saskatchewan government announced last week that it's tightening its belt to deal with more than a billion-dollar drop in potash revenues and the finance minister acknowledged it was a mistake to rely so heavily on the resource to boost the provincial coffers.

The session also marks Lingenfelter's return to the legislature after he left nine years ago to work in the private sector. Both Lingenfelter and Wall say they expect lively sparring during the session.

"I think debate in the legislature is going to be animated," said the premier. "I hope it'll be obviously civil, I have no reason to expect it won't be."