Mr. Speaker, the member and I have debated this kind of issue in the past. I do not mean to diminish some of the inputs because I have as much concern for those who are ill or suffering or making demands on the system.
As I said earlier on, from the federal point of view we are in the position where we are funding. Those who are delivering the system and administering the system are at the provincial level. This is one of those disconnects where we are being held accountable for something for which we have no responsibility.
With respect to some of the figures the hon. member gave, the last figures I looked at a couple of months ago put us in third place among the OECD countries in public contribution to spending on health. We are marginally behind Germany and France and in fact we are ahead of the United States.
Most academics and researchers in the area would say that Canada is very much in line with virtually all the other major industrialized nations in the world, in terms of—