I'll start with the transfers to the jurisdictions under the health accord. Under our government and the health funding plans, we've increased the transfers to the jurisdictions. I was at the table when cuts were made to health care transfers. I was finance minister for Nunavut when significant reductions were made to education and health. What our government has stated time and time again is that we will not cut transfers. The finance ministers met in December and outlined the funding beyond 2014. The funding that's gone to jurisdictions is predictable and sustainable, and each jurisdiction can now focus on health priorities.
Since that time, I have had a number of meetings with provincial and territorial health ministers to talk about what lies beyond 2014, looking at innovative ways to make improvements in the delivery of health care. I outlined those in my opening remarks to the committee this morning.
I will continue to meet with my provincial and territorial counterparts in health to discuss health care, which was not the discussion in 2004. The health accord was about funding at the time and it had nothing to do with what health indicators this country should be focusing on. That's precisely what I'm doing with the jurisdictions on the issue of priorities for Canadians.
In the area of sodium and trans fats, we continue to move forward. As with any other program, there are recommendations that come forward, and a number of options are laid out, together with proposed initiatives. We've had some discussions with the federal-provincial-territorial health ministers. I'll use sodium as an example. For a lack of better words, there are 10 ways to skin a cat, and there are different ways we can get to the outcomes we're looking at. I think right now we are making progress in the right direction.
We cannot deal with the health of Canadians one ingredient at a time: trans fat, salt, sugar, whatnot. We need to look at a broader strategy for keeping the population healthy in Canada. That declaration was signed off by federal-provincial-territorial health ministers in Nova Scotia. It was on building healthy Canadians, and it focused on combatting childhood obesity, which is an epidemic now. We had an historic meeting that brought a number of sectors together—the food industry, the health care professionals, the volunteer groups—to look at how we deal with this issue on a broader scale.