Evidence of meeting #49 for Health in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was funding.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
I understand that. I know you're working on it. That's why I want to know if, when it's done, we can get a copy of it. That's my question.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Thank you.
Second, in the minister's mandate letter, she was tasked with producing plain packaged tobacco legislation. We know that every month young Canadians start smoking and that many of those people will develop serious illnesses and die. We know that. We also know that plain packaging for tobacco products is effective in preventing people from starting smoking.
Can you tell us when we're going to see plain packaged tobacco legislation introduced in the House?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
Just by looking at my latest notes on this, I believe our plan is to move ahead on plain packaging relatively expeditiously. We have legislation before the House now, in BillS-5, that will give us some additional authorities needed to take action on plain packaging. We would be doing this largely through regulation, so I don't think you're going to be seeing a plain packaging bill as a stand-alone. The legislation we've already brought into the House will give us some extra oomph that will be needed, but we would be looking at probably, largely, regulatory measures to move ahead.
I just want to underline that we are entirely dedicated to getting this done and getting it done as quickly as possible, but we would not envisage another bill that would need to be brought forward for that.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
What I'm looking for is when this will be enforced in Canada. It's been 18 months since the mandate letter was given. That's a year and a half. People are starting smoking, and they're dying. When are we going to see actual action taken?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
I'll come back with what the proposed timetable is. I don't have it immediately at my fingertips.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Okay.
My final question is on overdose prevention sites. As you know, in Vancouver there's been at least two supervised consumption sites that have popped up, and they're operating illegally. It's only through the courage of the people who are staffing those, at great risk to themselves, sometimes their professional credentials, but they're doing it because they know that these are saving lives.
Has there been any consideration given to the health minister's granting an emergency exemption to those overdose prevention sites that we know are operating, that we know are saving lives, but that you're forcing to act illegally without that exemption?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
What I can say is that we are in receipt of a number of applications for these supervised consumption facilities, including a number in B.C. As I think the minister indicated, we made a commitment to process those as expeditiously as possible within the confines of the law. In a lot of cases, we're actually kind of waiting on things from the proponents in order to be able to move forward with our review. We're very hopeful, in the coming weeks, to be able to put in place some additional transparency measures to give people a sense of where various applications are in the queue.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Mr. Kennedy, can I just interrupt you?
These are unique cases. These are operating now. I'm not talking about people who want to open them and who are under the current application process. I'm talking about two sites that you know are operating right now in Canada. Does the minister have the power to grant an exemption, if she wanted to, to those sites that are operating right now?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
I think what the government has been pretty clear on is its willingness to move as expeditiously as possible to approve new supervised consumption facilities. That's what we're working on, and that's the conversation we're having with British Columbia.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bill Casey
Time's up.
That completes our official round of questions, but in the past, when we had the same circumstance of excellent witnesses and time left, we established another round of four questions at five minutes each.
Is that the consensus of the committee? Is that all right with everybody?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bill Casey
The last time this happened we took another round of four questions in the order of the original round, but for five minutes each, not seven.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bill Casey
I think we have time to do seven, but we don't have time to do a full round. We could, then, do another round of seven.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Could we just do another first round, of four times seven minutes?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bill Casey
Yes, we can.
Is that the consensus?
All right.
We'll start our questioning with the Liberal Party. Do we have an interested questioner?
Mr. Oliver.
Liberal
John Oliver Liberal Oakville, ON
If anyone else wants to share with me, let me know.
First of all, it's great to see health accords being reintroduced in Canada. I think it was in 2004 that we last had health accords in place. There was a lapse. It's good to see the provincial and federal and territorial governments working together again to get agreements.
To start with mental health, a significant amount of funding has flowed. There's always a worry that money flows out that is intended for mental health, but it is redirected and can be used in areas other than the health profile.
Are you working on measures to ensure that provinces and territories use the mental health funding specifically for mental health programs? Have you put in place any metrics, measures, or performance indicators that would track to see whether the investment has helped people who are suffering from mental illness?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
As the government indicated in the various news releases announcing the achievement of an agreement on funding with each jurisdiction, you may have noticed that there was language in them about the next step being to work on targets and indicators and so on. That is exactly the conversation we are having with the provinces and territories.
The minister and the government generally have been pretty clear right from the outset that there's a desire to put money in to help transform the system, but that as part of it, doing so is going to require that there be agreement on what the funds are spent on and that there be some accounting to Canadians for the results achieved. That's the conversation we're having now.
Indeed the hope—or more than a hope, the objective—is to have a good sense of where the money will go, measures that we can report on publicly, and mechanisms that everybody is comfortable with to allow that reporting to take place. That's the conversation we're engaged in right now.
Liberal
John Oliver Liberal Oakville, ON
That's great.
Could you give some examples of what those measures or indicators might be? I know they're under negotiation, but could you share with the committee some of the specifics from your ministry?
Deputy Minister, Department of Health
As I said, I don't want to prejudge what the provinces and territories might wish to see in the conversations we're having, but I can indicate, for example, that we've been pretty clear with our partners—and they seem pretty open-minded about it—that we would like to see an important investment in mental health services aimed at young people. There's a lot of research indicating that getting to young people with mild to moderate symptoms early on has a really beneficial impact later in life, whereas if they continue with their difficulties they become progressively worse. That's something the provinces and territories have indicated they are interested in.
You could imagine an indicator, for example, about how long it takes for young people under the age of 25 or something to get access to basic mental health service, or how widespread the access is. Those are the kinds of conversations we're having now.
Liberal
John Oliver Liberal Oakville, ON
Mr. Chair, Mr. Kang would like to have 30 seconds of my time. Could you let me know when I have about 30 seconds left?
Liberal
John Oliver Liberal Oakville, ON
My second question is for CIHR.
There's been an investment of about $1 million over five years to do research into gender and sex effects of opioid use.
How is it progressing? How many studies have been identified? Where does this stand?
Michel Perron Vice-President, External Affairs and Business Development, Canadian Institutes of Health Research
Indeed the issue of gender, sex, and opiate use is an important one for CIHR. Our institute of gender and health is looking at this matter on a regular basis and investing in a significant number of areas.
Most recently we attended the opiate summit co-hosted by the minister, at which we committed to launching synthesis grants in the area of opiate addiction, specifically to have a better understanding of some of the emerging science around the issue of opiates addiction, particularly concerning the way the elements of gender and sex affect opiate use and its treatment. These are commitments we have made that we are launching shortly as part of a broader package of initiatives that we're working on in this space.