Evidence of meeting #35 for Veterans Affairs in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was clinics.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
NDP
Peter Stoffer NDP Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS
Then I would give this advice to Madam Hinton. Gerald Lefebvre, who's the spokesperson for Mr. Thompson, said, and I quote, “until we have completed the full health care review”. It doesn't say until we work in collaboration with the veterans affairs committee. The thing is it says “until we have completed”. Who's “we”?
If they're waiting for us to give them recommendations, then they should say that, because in the paper it says very clearly “until we have completed the full health care review”.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Peter, we agreed as a committee at the very beginning of this that we were going to study the health care issue and we were going to make recommendations.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
So when he's using “we” in his sentence—I mean, I didn't say those words.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
I know. He said those words. My assumption is that he's referring to the royal “we”, if you will--all of us. So he's waiting for input, and this committee has yet to begin on the health care review.
NDP
Peter Stoffer NDP Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS
Would it be possible then, if it's the will of the committee not to have the officials here, to have a letter from them stating where they're at? Are they near completion? It would be nice to have the department say, “We're waiting for the committee's recommendation before we make our final summation.” That would be nice to hear.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
All right. I'll take that message back. I think it's an unspoken assumption on the part of the department that they understand this committee is going to be looking into the health care review. They're waiting for us to do that to give them our recommendations.
NDP
Peter Stoffer NDP Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS
And I agree, but the thing is I thought it was an unspoken thing, too, that they would wait until we completed our bill of rights recommendations.
Conservative
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Peter, if you're more comfortable having everything spelled out for you, I'll do that for you. I'd be happy to.
Liberal
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Brent St. Denis
So we're just going to withdraw that motion for the time being.
Is there anything else?
Thank you very much, colleagues.
The meeting is adjourned.
