Evidence of meeting #20 for Health in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was need.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Dr. Lemire.
The last person to pose questions in today's session is Mr. Davies.
You have two and a half minutes.
5:30 p.m.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Thank you.
Picking up on Monsieur Garon's question, we have heard repeatedly that we need a health funding summit involving the provincial and territorial premiers as well as the Prime Minister to discuss the Canada health transfer.
It strikes me that what you're talking about here are some very targeted ideas about how we could put at least $2.25 billion, I think, into the fund to address the health care shortage.
Just by a show of hands, how many of you would like to see a health funding summit for prioritizing initiatives necessary for resolving Canada's health workforce crisis? Do we need that?
Okay. There are people in the room putting their hands up. For the record, everyone put their hands up. Thank you.
In terms of this national licensure, I want to pick up on what my colleague Dr. Powlowski said. There may be different provincial standards for various things, but I can't believe that the qualifications of a doctor or a nurse in New Brunswick deviate from those of a doctor or a nurse in Manitoba or British Columbia.
When you are raising this, is anybody raising jurisdictional issues here? Is any province, in your view, holding up their jurisdiction to prevent this concept of a national licensure, or are you hearing positive results from the provincial colleagues you've talked to?
5:30 p.m.
President, Canadian Medical Association
I can comment on that.
You are right that if you are a Canadian-trained, Canadian-credentialed physician, you are eligible for licensure in any province or territory. It's not an issue that you won't be licensed. You just have to go through the steps to obtain the licence. The requirements for that are the same. That's not always necessarily true if you're internationally trained, but it is if you're Canadian-trained.
I think we're starting to see some shift in terms of people's willingness. Again, the regulatory bodies all have their way of doing things. I think everyone naturally thinks their way of doing things may be the best or the safest. I think we see that protectionism in many aspects of how people work. But I do think the pandemic has shifted that. I think people are starting to see now the need for more co-operation, the need to be able to leverage virtual care, the crisis that the health workforce is in, and the need to sort of back away from some of these more protectionist ideas and to more of a collaborative lens.
It doesn't mean there would be no role for the provincial regulatory bodies. It would be more about creating opportunities to collaborate and reimagine this somewhat. There would still be responsibility for them and a role for them to play. But I think we probably are closer to that reality than we were prepandemic. I think if you had asked people the same question three years ago, they might have said they were really far off from that ever happening. I think we're closer now. I think it's just going to need that kind of final push to get it over the finish line.
In my view, if we were able to pivot an entire country to virtual care essentially within 48 hours, I think we can achieve this as well.
5:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Dr. Smart and Mr. Davies. That's a very optimistic note on which to end.
I'd like to share with you, witnesses, that this is probably the last panel for this study. Unless there are other suggestions for further witnesses, I expect that we're probably going to be issuing drafting instructions fairly soon. Thank you so much for helping us through this journey with your patience and your very thorough answers. It was greatly appreciated. Thank you as well for your work on the road map. I do expect that it will be a very important element of the report we bring forward.
Colleagues, I have just a couple of things to deal with before we wrap up. Wednesday's meeting will be a do-over of the meeting that was cancelled last Wednesday. It will be with the same witnesses, with committee business at the end to talk about what we're going to do next. We also have the Finnish delegation coming in this Wednesday at noon. We encourage you to be there.
Is it the will of the committee to adjourn the meeting?
5:30 p.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.