MLAs were in session at the legislature for nearly 20 hours Thursday after recently suspended Dr. Raj Sherman proposed an amendment to legislation that would limit ER wait times in Alberta.

The amendment dominated the majority of the debate that began Wednesday evening and finally wrapped up late Thursday.

The Tories do not want this amendment going through. The Tories said legislating ER wait times would mean they would have to do the same thing for other services such as wait times for hip replacement surgeries. And they argue that is not a reasonable thing to do.

"It's just not practical. When you are putting things into legislation you are making a law. What would happen if you put something into a law and for some reason or another that wait times didn't get met what are you going to do? Are you going to hold the doctors at fault? You going to fire people for it? It's just not practical," said Health Minister Gene Zwozdesky.

A handful of ER doctors sat in on the debate lending their opinion to the topic. Fifth year resident at the Royal Alexandra said she supports Sherman's efforts to get the amendment through.

"I feel strongly that what Raj is doing is very important for the patients of Alberta, for the voters of Alberta. Last week we had a patient wait 7 hours before being seen to find out he had a big tumour in his brain and needed to be transferred to another hospital for neuro-surgical care," said Dr. Jennifer Williams who joined the Royal Alex in January.

Sherman told CTV News despite the outcome of this amendment, his political career is likely coming to end.

"If things stay the way they are I won't be running again next election. I've tried from within the system. I'm preparing to go back to the front lines," he said.

It's not likely this amendment will pass since the Tories hold such a wide majority in the house. The debate forced the cancellation of question period.

The debate on the amendment is slated to resume Monday evening.

The past week-and-a-half, Sherman has been making headlines across the province.

Earlier in the week, Sherman apologized to Energy Minister Ron Liepert for comments he made last week. But Liepert didn't accept the apology, instead saying he would rather have Sherman retract his statements.

Last week while attending a health meeting, Sherman singled out former health minister, Ron Liepert, who he said was "rude and offensive to front-line staff."

"The previous minister, to be honest, was quite rude and offensive to all front-line staff. Doctors, nurses and patients. I allowed that to happen. I didn't speak up, so I take responsibility for that," Sherman was quoted as saying.

Liepert called the comment "hurtful and "totally inappropriate."

And even though Sherman apologized for hurting Liepert's feelings, it wasn't enough for the minister.

"I don't want an apology. I want him to withdraw publicly... retract the remarks he made about my character that he can't substantiate," said Liepert.

When asked if he was going to retract the comments he made about Liepert, Sherman told CTV News: "When you make certain comments...once you make them you can't retract them."

That incident came just a day after Sherman was suspended from the PC caucus.

Premier Ed Stelmach was quick to announce that Edmonton-Rutherford MLA Fred Horne will take over Sherman's previous post as the parliamentary assistant for health.

Previous to that, Sherman took an opportunity to air his frustration and concern with the province's health care system in an e-mail to more than 30 people, a list that included Premier Ed Stelmach and Health Minister Gene Zwozdesky.

He held nothing back in the e-mail revealing that he had recently offered his resignation to the minister after he felt he could no longer support decisions made by Alberta Health Services.

Sherman also took direct aim at the premier accusing Stelmach of broken promises.

Sherman said his frustrations peaked recently because his ailing father had several near-death experiences while waiting for health care, which he also opened up about in the e-mail.

The all-night session at the legislature tails the dismissal of the top doc of Alberta Health Services (AHS), Dr. Stephen Duckett. The chairman of the AHS board announced to media Wednesday afternoon that CEO and President Dr. Stephen Duckett has been released from his position.

The board had met twice to discuss the fate of Duckett's career with AHS.

Hughes said both the 14-member board and Duckett jointly agreed that "now is the time to move on."

"We agreed with Dr. Duckett that he would no longer continue to stay on as the CEO because his ability to be effective in that role...we felt was compromised," said Hughes.

Hughes said Dr. Chris Eagle, the current Executive Vice President of Quality and Services improvement for Alberta Health Services, will now step in as the acting CEO.

Duckett's dismissal comes after he made headlines in Edmonton and around the world after a 2-minute and 13-second exchange with reporters, including CTV, in which he refused to answer questions about health care reforms -- because he was eating a cookie.

Duckett apologized the next day via his blog, but still hasn't addressed the media directly.

Hughes said Duckett's unusual recent exchange with reporters was one element of his dismissal. The chairman said the board had full confidence in Duckett right up until last week's "cookie" incident.

With files from Scott Roberts