Read the articles. Pardon me, minister, but, when the conference was held, I believe you had to be pushed a number of times to get there more quickly.
A very long time ago in Quebec, you prohibited a completely inoffensive book entitled Drugs: Know the Facts, Cut Your Risks. That was a matter of $1 million. That book, which had been approved by Quebec's health minister, Mr. Couillard, provided information on various aspects of the drugs in circulation, their effects, the risks they entailed, the laws involved and available help. How could a book like that lead our young people to take drugs lightly? We see that there is a mentality, a strategy behind all that. One sense is that there is censorship.
You say you're concerned about public opinion. However, I get the impression that your public opinion is the one that directs your ideological orientation. We hear other stories, regardless of whether they come from researchers or people who are working hard to fight the increase in substance abuse or to help people coping with AIDS or Hepatitis C.
I'd like you to try to defend your position. Earlier you said this was a matter of ethics. In your view, addicts need clothing and housing. I think we all need that. We aren't opposed to your strategy, but we would like to know what will happen if you implement it. As for the assistance you want to offer, you have to understand that some people won't accept it. They say it's a part of the population that is marginalized. Harm reduction can't stop all drug use. The point, for example, is to stop the spread of HIV-AIDS and hepatitis C, to see that other people aren't infected. That's one of the goals of Insite.
I think you're headed in the wrong direction, minister. Like you, I think the objective is praiseworthy, but it can be achieved without a place like Insite being closed. You say you want to support the entire network that's working in this field and to increase funding for HIV-AIDS assistance organizations, but, of the $84 million allocated in 2008, $16 million has been withdrawn. You say you encourage research for a vaccine, and I agree with you: we have to do it. However, you don't seem to be allocating resources to the field in order to better combat the spread of drug use, HIV-AIDS or Hepatitis C.