Madam Speaker, I was somewhat surprised by the comments of the Reform member, especially when he talked about health care. Obviously the Reform Party wants to privatize health care. It is a party that has not defended social programs. We are the only party that has defended social programs in this House, in spite of the attacks and reductions by the Liberal government.
The Reform Party has not spoken in defence of social programs. It is obviously opening the door to privatization of health care. Our health care system is one of the standards of Canada, one of the hallmarks of Canada, one of the achievements of Canada. This party is talking about privatizing health care and giving us the model, obviously, of the American system where if a person gets sick he or she risks going bankrupt very quickly.
Under the cover of comments of New Zealand's problems and success story, among all the other comments that have been made, which unfortunately Americanize things that have been good for Canada, he is again opening the door to a system that has proven to be costly and wasteful and even dangerous, where people go bankrupt if they become ill.
That is not an avenue which is very constructive. It is probably even worse than what the federal government is now doing. The federal government has not been doing very much in terms of helping people, in terms of the social programs, in terms of health care. The government in trying to reduce its deficit has attacked unemployed people and senior citizens. It has tried to put more debt on students. It is now even increasing the rent of the poorest people in our society. That is what the government is doing now, which is probably the worst thing that I can imagine, and the hon. member is suggesting something which is even worse.
I ask the member how privatizing the health care system in Canada would improve the debt problem?