We need the leadership and somebody holding the rudder of the ship, so with Bill C-277, it's having a secretariat, starting to form a work group. We can have that oversight to start to put in the standards, to make sure the indicators and so on are in place so that we can gather the proper data so that we can see where the real gaps are, and then really start to fill those.
We have a lot of recommendations on how the gaps can be filled, but we need that oversight and the authority to start saying, “Okay, this has to happen.” There has to be an investment of some monies, and I know there have been promises of monies going towards home care.
I was in Nova Scotia when the last health report came around and there was the basket of services. Within that, there was supposed to be a fair bit of money for palliative care issues within the provinces. I know in Atlantic Canada it was years before we saw anything happen. We did eventually, in Nova Scotia, start to see some improvements in the amount that home care patients with palliative care needs could have. It was just two years ago that we actually had medications, what we call palliative care medication entitlement, in place, so it was that long after to get anything happening.
Those are very basic things. We haven't had any increase in staffing for our programs since 2004 despite having a 400% increase in referrals. We need human resources. We need the specialty teams who can then start to work out, fan out, provide the education, the mentorship, the capacity building to raise the tide so that all the ships rise and we can all do this better.