Mr. Speaker, today is World Health Day. I rise to applaud the efforts of the government in the area of health for Canadians.
We promised a National Forum on Health and the national forum recently announced its recommendations which saw light in the 1997 budget. We stabilized Canada health and social transfers to the provinces with $25 billion annually. We committed $300 million over the next three years for new health initiatives. Of that, $150 million are devoted to helping the provinces put in place new approaches to areas like home care, drug coverage and other innovations.
We have put $100 million into community action programs for children and the Canada prenatal nutrition program. The government remains committed to the values and principles of the Canada Health Act. We will not jeopardize the system with some broad based tax cuts like the opponents would.
There is no question that our publicly funded system is one of the greatest achievements. There is no doubt the government is working to keep it so.
Let us commit ourselves to it today on World Health Day.