The transfer payments are meant for health, education and social services.
As equalization is changed so that everyone gets treated fairly across the country on a per capita basis there will be regions of Canada which simply will not have the funds to deliver equal and adequate health care, or what the member refers to as universal, affordable and high quality health care. It is simply not going to happen in the poorer regions of this country. There is no way to do it without money.
This budget was supposed to put money back into the health care system, but in Newfoundland that simply will not happen. The Liberal minister of health for Newfoundland, as well as the Liberal premier, who has so much in common with the finance minister, knows that we will have a worse health care system rather than a better one in Newfoundland and Labrador as a result of this budget.