Mr. Speaker, when the Romanow report was tabled I genuinely hoped and welcomed the fact, because I believed it to be true, that we had put the ideological debates behind us. We now had before us a detailed, evidence-based blueprint, a set of concrete well researched recommendations widely supported by Canadians, and we were going to get on with rebuilding and strengthening our public not for profit health care system.
I heard a question from a member of the Conservative Party. I commend him because it is an accurate reflection of where his party stands. It is hell bent to remain on an ideological track arguing for the private delivery of health care when the evidence shows that it is not only more cost efficient for these health services to be delivered through the public not for profit system, but it is safer.
A team of outstanding highly respected medical researchers in this country said last night at a public meeting and again this morning in my office:
Why is any government in this country allowing private for profit investor owned health care corporations to put the health of Canadians at risk? Because the evidence is absolutely clear that the reason we are not going to go farther down that road is because people die in what is a less healthy, less safe, less efficient, less effective health care delivery mode and that is the for profit investor owned health corporation model.
Now is the time that Canadians want us to put this ideological debate behind us and they want us to deal with the facts. The facts are that the rate of death of people in for profit investor owned hospitals in North America is dramatically higher. We are talking about thousands of people who will die if we go farther down that road.
We need to reverse course. We need to get back onto the public not for profit system and that means dealing with the crisis that has been caused by the federal government. Back in 1995 it started the massive unilateral withdrawal of funds to our public health care system, the demarketing of confidence in public health care, and allowed the cannibalization by profit seekers of vulnerable pieces of the public health care system. It needs to stop with the re-investment of public dollars into our public not for profit system.