Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member for St. Paul's.
The issue before the House is generally about health care and the condition of health care and how we address the challenges of health care today.
This morning I had the opportunity to listen to the debate and I was most impressed with the presentation of the health minister with regard to resisting getting into the trenches with others in pointing fingers at who is at fault. It was a responsible approach to saying that we have challenges, we have the opportunity and we are committed to addressing those challenges and to working in co-operation with all of the stakeholders in the health system of Canada. I congratulate him for taking the high road.
The federal government's principal responsibilities come under the Canada Health Act. I think most members will know that the Canada Health Act contains five principles. Those principles are: universality, accessibility, portability, comprehensiveness and publicly funded. If we think about the Canada Health Act, it really is expressing a value statement for Canadians.
I was told at one time that about 75% or more of the health care costs in the lifetime of a human being will be incurred in the last year of his or her life. When we consider the enormity of the costs at the end of our years, we wonder whether there would be an automatic pressure to save money by simply reducing our standards of health care, reducing our care for the aged and asking why would we spend the money to prolong death rather than spending it elsewhere to extend life. It is a significant ethical issue.
Canadians have made their choice with regard to the ethics of our health care system. We have people who are living longer and we continue to invest in our health care system to make sure that Canadians not only live longer, but they live a high quality of life throughout all of their years. Those are some of the underlying principles. It is not just about dollars. It is about the values that Canadians hold.
The National Forum on Health did two years worth of work. It had the best experts in Canada in health care delivery. It went across the country and consulted very broadly. It came to the conclusion when it reported to the health minister and to parliament that there were enough funds in the system. It said there many areas within the health care system had dollars which could have been spent much more wisely and productively in terms of getting healthier outcomes for Canadians.
I believe that was the first instance in which it was time for the federal government and the provinces to sit down to start to discuss how to plan for the health care system in the future, knowing that we have an aging society and that our lifestyles, stress and activity levels make us more at risk for having health needs. The world changes and people change but our values do not. Our values have remained firm and consistent. We want to provide quality care in terms of medically necessary services for Canadians.
A few issues were raised by the National Forum on Health on which I believe the health minister has already had consultations with the provinces. On the issue of privately funded services, I understand that over 70% of health care expenditures in Canada are financed from the public purse with the remaining coming from private sources.
Some would say the public expenditures are too high and should be restricted to a basic array of services, basic bare bones, medically necessary life threatening type activities, emergencies or obstetrics type stuff. Others say we need to maintain a high level of public funding for health and, if anything, the funding should be expanded to cover services that go beyond physicians and hospitals, which has been traditionally federal responsibility or federal obligations with regard to funding.
The National Forum on Health also raised the issue about whether there was enough money. From an international perspective it found that the Canada health care system did not appear to be underfunded and was one of the most expensive systems in the world. These are issues which have to be agreed upon with the provinces.
There was also the combination of health reform and fiscal restraint to give rise to rationing and issues around the fringes of the principles of the Canada Health Act. It is important for Canadians and legislators to look at these issues and at how Canada is evolving and responding to the health care needs of Canadians.
Canadians have made it very clear that health care is their number one priority. The Government of Canada responded in the last budget with $11.5 billion for health and a further $2.5 billion in budget 2000. That is not the end of it. That is the beginning of supporting our health care system. Very clearly a scope of discussion is necessary for the federal government and all the stakeholders, the provinces, the territories and others, to address a broad range of issues to ensure that the health care priority of Canadians is being met in a co-operative and collaborative fashion by all stakeholders.
In the remaining time I want to talk about my experience in the health care system. Before I became a member of parliament I was a member of the board of trustees of the Mississauga hospital for about nine years. During that period I acted as treasurer for some five years and one year as the vice-chair of the board. I did have an opportunity to deal with all aspects of financing of health care funding.
In my experience after nine years on the board of trustees of the Mississauga hospital I developed a sincere and deep respect for our health care professionals. Doctors and nurses in Canada have the highest standards for which we could ever ask. In a number of cases we were faced with issues where corners were being cut. Not in one instance do I remember the medical staffs or the nursing staffs saying that they would compromise the quality of their work. They would rather not do the procedures or not attempt to do the job unless they could do it to the best of their ability. The professional code of conduct of our health caregivers is absolutely irrefutable, and I want to make that known.
The whole idea of a health care crisis is possibly more show than anything, only from the standpoint that our health care system is an enormous system with many stakeholders and many aspects to it. Things do not happen very quickly in the health care system. It is a gradualist approach. It is a reflecting strategy as priorities move and things happen within our value system. We negotiate, compromise and discuss ways in which we can meet priorities.
We have had a tremendous improvement in the health care system not only in technology but also in medicine, the pharmacare side of things. Hospitals and medical procedures can now be performed in ways which were never contemplated before. The average length of stay for a patient at the Mississauga hospital actually went down from approximately 6.8 days per patient to 4.2 days. The average length of stay went down significantly. This means that bed days were saved and that money for the hospital and our health care system was saved. This had no impact on the re-admission rate. The work that was done showed that it was taking advantage of new technology.
During this period the Mississauga hospital reduced its beds from 650 to 600. At the same time it actually served more people with less beds in their catchment area by making this move, again showing the progress of our health system. Not only are the lifestyles of Canadians changing but also the technology in medicine in Canada is changing. It means that there has to be a constant dialogue.
I congratulate the Minister of Health for making a firm commitment to interim funding for health care as well as a firm commitment to deal with all stakeholders to ensure a safe and healthy system for all Canadians.