I thought I was, Madam Speaker. I did not say you once. I meant the opposition that is heckling over there. At any rate, I think I have made my point for the people who are watching that the government is devoid of ideas and that is why we are involved in this debate today.
I will be splitting my time, Madam Speaker, to give some time to my hon. colleague from Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, who has done an incredible amount of work over the years on the issue of health care. He has tirelessly recommended reforms and changes to our present health care system, much more than I have ever heard come from any of a succession of health care ministers of the government, since I came here in 1993, and much more than I have ever heard from anybody on that side of the House, other than to suggest the status quo.
If Liberal members wanted to be involved in the debate why were they not up a couple of hours ago when they had a slot that they gave to the socialists. They had an extra 10 minute slot but nobody wanted to talk over there so they gave it to the NDP. Now they want to talk when I am trying to talk. This is just incredible.
The Liberals want to be involved in the debate on health care. They are trying to suggest that the problem rests with the provinces and they are the reason we have these problems with health care. Yet the government, from 1994 to 2001, slashed cumulatively $25 billion from health care transfers to the provinces. Then it says the provinces have created the problem because they are the ones that administer health care.
I think the Canadian people are smarter than that. They know that the problem originated right over there when the Liberals made poor spending choices. They would rather subsidize businesses and some of their friends with pork-barrel politics and patronage. Those are the choices they made rather than put money into health care and our national defence, which is a whole other issue.
Obviously money alone is simply not enough. We on this side recognize that. For the Kirby report, and then pretty soon the Romanow report, to come out and suggest that $5 billion, or $6 billion or $9 billion or, whatever the magical number is, will somehow solve the health care problems that we face is simply a falsehood.
I want to take a couple of minutes to mention that I represent a huge rural riding. Prince George--Peace River is the eighth largest riding in the country, with over 200,000 square kilometres. We have a serious shortage of doctors, nurses and trained medical professionals up in northern British Columbia. From talking to a number of my colleagues, I know that is not unique to towns like Fort St. John, Dawson Creek, Fort Nelson, Mackenzie, Tumbler Ridge, Chetwynd, or even Prince George, for that matter, which is a major centre in central northern British Columbia, or Kamloops. It is a serious problem throughout British Columbia and all across the country.
Believe it or not, I recently read some good articles in the Ottawa Citizen . It is running stories this week in the city section about the growing shortage of health care professionals and doctors in Ontario and in the City of Ottawa. In yesterday's paper it said that 25 years ago there was a decision made that we had too many doctors so the provinces took action to stem the flow. Those measures were so successful that today 900,000 Ontarians have no family doctor.
This is serious. The status quo is not good enough. Over the last number of years we have heard Canadian Alliance MPs say over and over again that we seriously have to address this issue. We cannot just throw a few more billion dollars at it, circle the wagons and somehow pretend that will solve the problems of health care. People on waiting lists to see a doctor are dying.
I talked to some doctors the other day when they were here for their annual lobbying efforts to try to educate politicians about some of the problems they face on a daily basis. One doctor told me that it was not just a problem with doctors. Sometimes a doctor can examine a patient, arrange for an operating room, get it set up for the operation and then one person is missing.
Maybe it is the recovery room nurse who is not there and the whole operation is put on hold and people are told to go away because they cannot operate. The room is available. The doctors and the anesthesiologist are there. Everything is there except for one cog in the system, and the patient suffers and unfortunately sometimes dies. We have to get serious about this.
I want to give some time to my hon. colleague from Esquimalt--Juan de Fuca, a doctor who has actually practised in my riding of Prince George--Peace River, in the city of Prince George, for a number of years. As with many rural MPs from all parties, I fight all the time to try to help foreign doctors get into this country, and thank God we have them, but that too is not the answer.
The country is seriously short of medical professionals and money alone is not going to solve the problem. We have to start looking at a lot of different options, one of which I spoke about earlier, which is alternative medicine. We have to look at more ways to prevent illness rather than react to it.
I am going to give my remaining time to my colleague.