Madam Speaker, I appreciate the intent of the motion but regrettably I cannot support it. I would like to take a moment to explain why.
Essentially the motion is calling for the Minister of Health to table a report assessing the adequacy of the cash transfer portion of the Canada health and social transfer.
I wonder why we have any confidence that the federal government will be a great protector of health care. Given the past history of the federal government, why in the world would we have even a shred of confidence in the government to protect health care?
I remind members once again what the Prime Minister said when he was in the 1993 leadership debate. This is exactly what transpired in that debate. The leader of the Reform Party said: “What specifically is your commitment to the level of federal transfer payments for health care? Would you keep them at the current level?” The Prime Minister responded: “I said yesterday in reply to Mr. Bouchard that I promised that they will not go down and I hope that we will be able to increase them”. I guess that did not happen, did it?
I heard the parliamentary secretary say a moment ago that the government has increased transfers for health care by $1.5 billion. He forgot to mention that the government cut transfers for health care and higher education by $7.5 billion, the largest cut to health care in the history of the country. The Liberal government closed more hospitals, shut down more hospital beds than all the provincial governments combined. Why in the world would we think for a moment that somehow the federal government will be some great protector of health care in this country?
We know that when the provincial ministers brought down their budgets this spring in each and every case they increased spending for health care.
I point out to my colleagues in the New Democratic Party that the NDP government in Saskatchewan increased spending for health care. All provincial governments did that because they are closer to the people. They know that if they make bad decisions about health care, people will be protesting on their lawn, not on the lawn of Parliament Hill, which incidentally is probably where they should have been protesting when the government blatantly broke its 1993 election promise not to cut transfers for health care and higher education.
The provinces know that people will be on their lawn protesting. They know that when there is a newspaper story about people having to wait in hallways to get treatment for health care it will be the provincial health ministers who feel the heat first and most.
That is why I cannot agree with this motion. I think it is ridiculous to ask the very people who took the broad axe to health care to be the protectors of health care, to somehow give them some new power and to give people a false sense of security that somehow the federal government has the best interests of Canadians in mind. It simply does not, it did not and we know the record is very clear that given the opportunity the first thing it does when there is a crunch is cut health care and higher education. Then when the budget was brought down, government members said “we are not going to cut it as deeply as we said we were, so now we should be honoured and deserve applause from people”. It is absolutely ridiculous.
I want to repeat the Prime Minister's quote. He said during the 1993 leaders debate: “I said yesterday in reply to Mr. Bouchard that I promised they will not go down and I hope that we will be able to increase them”. That is what he said about the Canada health and social transfer. What a joke. Just another one of a dozen important election promises that the government has absolutely broken, and I guess it does so with impunity.
I do hope that my friends in the NDP and in other political parties will not be drawn in to believe that somehow the Minister of Health will be a great protector of health care when he has proved over and over again that he cannot be counted on to do that.
I also encourage my friends in the NDP to remember that they too have colleagues at the provincial level who have added money into budgets for health care precisely because the level of government that is closest to the people is much better able to gauge public sentiment.
I encourage my friends to rethink this motion. Remember that the real protectors of health care in Canada are the people at the lower levels of government, primarily in the provinces.