Welcome to your Parliament, Mr. Pelletier.
Mr. Joint Chair, I don't want to tell you our life story, but I am happy to see Mr. Pelletier again, as I knew him when he was an MP and minister in Quebec City, where I worked as a journalist. Later on, when I became an MP in Quebec City, he was a professor and commentator. I will not repeat what he had to say about my work right now, but we will talk about it later.
Mr. Pelletier, thank you so much. I want to thank your committee and thank you for doing such thorough and careful work. In less than five months, you produced a document filled with relevant information. Congratulations. I commend and thank you for that.
I would like to discuss two issues with you, one of which concerns the most vulnerable individuals. I would first like to talk about something that's right up your alley, cooperative federalism. Earlier, you talked about Canadian leadership. That is actually why we are here today.
Health care comes under provincial jurisdiction, but we have to know how much it will be affected by the Criminal Code. You are talking about Canadian leadership and cooperative federalism. So I would like to hear what you have to say about the following two hypotheses.
The Canadian government can set a specific limit to how far health care can go or it can instead leave it up to the provinces to define health care by limiting, in a way, the Criminal Code to allow the provinces to adjust. However, since we are basically talking about health care, which is entirely under provincial jurisdiction, that initiative should be the responsibility of each province. So every province will have the time to hold this debate, as Quebec has been doing for six years.
Do you think the legislation the federal government will introduce should be more specific, or should it instead give leeway to provincial legislative assemblies?