Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance says he has more money for health care if the provinces agree to the federal government's plan for health care reform. While the government plays carrots and sticks with the provinces over health care funding, people are dying while awaiting operations, emergency rooms resemble war zones and patients are sleeping on stretchers in hospital corridors.
Canadians want us to fix the system that is already broken before we embark on any new schemes. That fix urgently requires putting back the $4.5 billion a year that the Liberals have already taken out of the system.
If the government is serious about building the health care of tomorrow, it must first help save the system that we have today.