Mr. Speaker, the ministers of health met in Victoria this week to supposedly save medicare but instead they chose to sling insults at each other. All the while Canada's health care system continued its decline with increasing waiting lists, rationing of essential health care services and the massive exodus of expensive and highly trained professional staff.
We all care about medicare and want to see it continue. However an aging population, expensive technologies and an economic crisis have all combined to make medicare as we know it unsustainable. We must look at other new ways to preserve the intent of medicare which will ensure that all Canadians regardless of their income have essential health care services covered in a timely fashion.
The public does not accept the flawed logic of this government which prevents it from gaining access to medical services of their choice. All Canadians must be free to have medicare and a choice to ensure that the health care needs of all Canadians is met.