Debates of Feb. 11th, 2003

Canada Elections Act

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Since it would be helpful to have a member start and complete a speech in one sitting, I wonder if the House would agree to see the clock as being at 6:04 p.m.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

Is it agreed to see the clock at 6:04 p.m.?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Bakopanos)]

It being 6:04 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's Order Paper.

The House resumed from November 22, 2002 consideration of the motion that Bill C-202, An Act to amend the Canada Health Act (linguistic duality), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Canada Health Act

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am a very big fan of private members' business, especially when it involves proposed legislation which I consider to be wise and well thought out. Bill C-202 in the name of the member for Ottawa--Vanier is a very good piece of proposed legislation.

The member is the chair of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Official Languages. He has spoken out very passionately in this place as recently as the debate on Bill C-13 to get that piece of legislation subject to the Official Languages Act. As a consequence, the government even supported the motion and his reasoning. Even on a voice vote the House embraced it. It is a signal from this place that the Official Languages Act has a very special place in Canada and that all our legislation, all our agencies and all of those organizations which touch the fibre of Canada should be covered under the Official Languages Act.

I congratulate the member wholeheartedly for presenting Bill C-202. This will add the principle of respecting linguistic duality to the Canada Health Act specifically, but it is also a signal that we are ready to clean up all of the other areas. I am sure that the government will consider the member's recommendations.

The member spoke very eloquently to this bill. He wanted to ensure consistency in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the Canada Health Act and the Official Languages Act. We have to put our constitution, our legislation and our Official Languages Act on the same playing field because they fit very well and serve Canada very well.

The member gave a number of arguments. One was that effectively we would be adding a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act. We operate now under five principles but that sixth element is equally important. The Canada Health Act guides us in all the legislation to do with health. It provides the foundation on which all Canadians can get the services they need; comprehensiveness, accessibility, portability, et cetera, and in both official languages without hesitation. That is as important as effective delivery.

The member indicated that the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology held hearings on this matter and issued a report. A number of testimonials came from the provinces.

The federal government provides leadership in many ways but when the provinces come forward and say that this is a good idea and it is what we should be doing, then it is pretty important. When there are key players in each of the provinces who are prepared to make testimonials on behalf of the proposal that the member has raised and on which the Senate committee had hearings, those things are very powerful and should not be ignored.

Mr. Paul d'Entremont from Nova Scotia stated:

In Nova Scotia, there exists no provincial law or policy stipulating that services must be offered in French. This explains why access to health care in French is so very limited, and where such services are offered, they are provided thanks to the dogged persistence of individuals and community organizations.

That is very important. They are trying to get around it but they do not have the tools to make it happen. The quote continues:

Existing French services have often been put in place by chance, randomly, and the community fears losing them. The comments gathered during the recent consultation of the Acadian francophone population in our eight Acadian regions such as in the recent study carried out by the FCFA, bear witness to the fact that there is very little access to services in French.

That was the Nova Scotia representation. Nova Scotia does not have adequate access to services in French. Mr. d'Entremont went on to recommend that the federal government add a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act on linguistic duality.

In Ontario we have similar support. A representative from Ontario said specifically:

The data show that half the time, francophones living in minority situations have little or no access to health care services in their own language. In other words, a great deal remains to be done before we achieve equality as regards health care services for francophone minority communities.

Therefore Ontario has the same situation. The Ontario representative also supported a sixth principle on linguistic duality and the protection of minorities. We have again a very important reference from credible people who represent the interests of people in their provinces.

In British Columbia, Ms. Yseult Friolet, who is the Executive Director of the Fédération des francophones de la Colombie-Britannique in her testimony stated:

When we think of British Columbia, we often think about mountains and the sea, but we may forget that there are 61,000 francophones living in our beautiful province.

She went on to say:

There is also a large community of people who speak French as their second or third language. There are close to 250,000 people in our province who can speak French, which is roughly 7 per cent of the population.

She went on to add her support for a sixth principle for the Canada Health Act. She also appeared before the Romanow commission and made the same argument.

In Prince Edward Island it is a very similar situation. In representations by Ms. Élise Arsenault of the Centre communautaire Évangéline, she stated:

The community now wants the federal government to assume a leadership role in this regard by providing financial support to the provinces that wish to offer more health services in French and to include a sixth principle in the Canada Health Act.

From sea to sea to sea I could read testimonies from Quebec, from New Brunswick, from Yukon, but I believe that many members here would like to join in this debate to lend their support to the proposal that we should have this sixth element in the Canada Health Act because it is important to Canada. It is a constitutional issue. It is a minority rights issue. It is a parliamentary issue. Specifically, in the proposed bill it is also a health issue. I am very sure that once we deal with this aspect it will provide the springboard effect that is necessary for us to move forward in other legislation and with regard to the operations of other agencies.

As can be seen, the members of the official language communities are expressing their support for health care services in both official languages. Through a number of spokespeople, they have requested that the Government of Canada add a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act. Numerous communities have also spoken. They want to see their constitutional rights guaranteed when it comes to health.

We as members of the House of Commons are in a position to make that happen and I urge all members to vote in favour of Bill C-202. Let us make it unanimous, let us do it all stages and let us make this the law in Canada.

[Gurmant Grewal, Canadian Alliance, Surrey Central, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise on behalf of the constituents of Surrey Central to participate in the debate on Bill C-202, an act to amend the Canada Health Act. The bill would add a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act, ensuring that Canada's linguistic duality would be respected in the health care system everywhere in Canada.

I will begin by saying that opening up the Canada Health Act is certainly a bold move by the hon. member for Ottawa—Vanier. My initial reaction is to wholeheartedly support his private member's bill. However, upon further reflection, I must voice reservations.

Clearly, an individual's ability to communicate with his or her health care provider in a language in which the individual is comfortable is extremely important. For doctors to offer appropriate treatment, they must fully understand their patients. Unfortunately, language may sometimes act as a barrier to understanding and this may be detrimental to health.

I remember a patient was to be operated on in California. His left leg was to be amputated but because of a lack of communication somehow the doctors wrongly amputated his right leg. Ultimately both legs were amputated and the person had to suffer throughout his life. We understand that language and communication is important.

Bill C-202 seeks to ensure that Canadians have access to health care in both official languages. However the problem is that this proposal really ignores Canadian reality. In Canada today, especially in areas popular with immigrants, it would be nearly impossible to ensure that all Canadians have access to health care in their language of choice. It is not simply a case of bilingual service, service in English and in French. That is a dated view of our country.

Let us consider the riding of Surrey Central for a minute. There are 68,810 residents whose mother tongue is neither English nor French. According to the 2001 census, only 1,590 people in Surrey Central have French as their mother tongue and only 200 use French around the home. There are 11 other languages that more commonly are used in Surrey Central homes. Punjabi for instance is the mother tongue of 35,140 people in Surrey Central and 18,705 people use Punjabi as their home language in Surrey Central.

In this case, if we are truly interested in language rights and serving people in a language they can understand better and clearer, we should not be asking medical personnel to speak French. We should be asking them to speak Punjabi or another language. Even if we do so, it might do nothing to help the many thousands of residents who speak Cantonese, Filipino and Korean, just to name a few languages which are prevalent in Surrey Central.

Also, the proposed amendment to the Canada Health Act will do nothing for the 9,285 residents of Surrey Central who speak neither English nor French.

Requiring the provinces to provide bilingual services would make no sense in Surrey Central. French is simply not that prevalent in that region. It is far less popular than a whole slew of Asian languages.

Surrey Central is by no means unique. Throughout the B.C. lower mainland, in Toronto and in other areas with a heavy concentration of immigrants, we will find many Canadians who interact most comfortably in neither of our official languages.

Already multilingualism is a reality in Canada's largest urban centres. In Vancouver, one in six people have Chinese as their mother tongue. In the metropolitan area of Toronto nearly two million people have neither French nor English as their mother tongue. Many of these people are more comfortable speaking in Chinese, Punjabi, Urdu or Tamil than they are in English or French.

The Canadian reality is that 59.1% of Canadians are anglophone, English is their mother tongue; 42.9% francophone, French is their mother tongue; 18% allophone or non-official language as their mother tongue.

Only in Quebec and New Brunswick do francophones make up more than 4.4% of the population. Outside Quebec there are 980,270 francophones and 4.6 million allophones. If we exclude Quebec for the sake of this debate, there are nearly as many Chinese or East Indians as francophones in Canada. Therefore why stop only with linguistic duality in the health care system?

Regrettably economics must be a consideration when deciding upon adding a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act. There are now one million Canadians on wait lists for medical services. According to the Fraser Institute, total wait times from referral by a general practitioner to treatment averaged 16.5 weeks in 2001-02. That should not be acceptable.

There are 4.5 million Canadians who are unable to get a family physician. The provinces are already stretched in their efforts to deliver health care. They already have enough to deal with in addressing long wait lists, shortages of medical personnel and increasing public expectations. The federal government should not burden the provinces with new responsibilities, especially if there is no additional cash commitment to do so.

Bill C-202 states that the provision of health services for the linguistic minority shall take account of the human, material and financial resources for each facility and the social, cultural and linguistic characteristics of the members of the public served by the facility. This vague language leaves the bill open to wide interpretation. The Canada Health Act is already vague in a number of respects without need for further vagueness.

The Canada Health Act came into force in 1984. It sets out five criteria and certain other conditions that a province's health care insurance plan must meet in order for the government of that province to receive the full federal cash contribution under the Canada health and social transfer.

For the information of those who are watching this debate, the five criteria in the act include: universality, accessibility, comprehensiveness, portability and public administration. The act also contains specific provisions with respect to extra billing by physicians and user charges by hospitals.

Full compliance by some provinces has been from the beginning a problem. Part of the problem has been definitions or more specifically, the lack there of. What is mean by “medically necessary”? That is up to each individual province to decide for itself. The result is uneven public coverage across the country.

Likewise, what does the act mean by “reasonable access” to insured health services? With the growing prevalence of long waiting lines for medical services, it is little wonder people are asking whether they have reasonable access to health care services.

In 1984 many services, such as drugs, rehabilitation, recuperation and palliative care, were provided in hospitals and therefore covered by the act. Increasingly these services are provided in the home or community and as a result fall outside the scope of the Canada Health Act.

Health care gobbles up $10 billion annually in B.C. It accounts for 41¢ of every provincial tax dollar. The government has increased funding by some $1.1 billion but it still is not enough and further cost savings are being explored.

People in my community have been faced with the closure of Saint Mary's Hospital in nearby New Westminster. This means seven fewer operating rooms. Last year almost 1,800 Surrey residents had surgery in this hospital. Where do they go now?

Therefore I appreciate the efforts of the hon. member for Ottawa--Vanier. It is a noble idea but it will not pass a cost benefit analysis. It will not pass geographic and demographic criteria. Our health care priorities require tough and difficult decisions. We must consider those priorities, which are emergencies in many of our hospitals and communities.

We all watch the health care services that are required in our northern territories and so on. Each and every community suffers from the lack of health care services provided because of the lack of facilities. The government is the root cause for the deterioration of our health care services in our communities because it cut $25 million from our health care transfers since taking power in 1993.

Now the government wants to be perceived as the saviour of our health care. It is like an arsonist who sets a house on fire, then he is the first one seen with a bucket of water to put out the fire, and wants to be called a hero. That is what the government is trying to do.

The government created this mess in our health care services. It is time that we look into this issue seriously, carefully, and make prudent and diligent decisions to restore the health care services to seniors, children, the sick, and the destitute who are suffering because of the lack of those services.

Health care priorities are unique because they require tough and difficult decisions. Sometimes we must make choices and we have to live with them. This is an excellent effort by the member. However, it will not pass the test of a cost benefit analysis as well as the demographic realities.

[John Harvard, Liberal, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-202 and I want to pay tribute to the member for Ottawa—Vanier, the sponsor of the bill. His work around the bill has been exemplary.

On behalf of all Manitobans I wish to express my support for Bill C-202 which would add the principle of respecting linguistic duality to the Canada Health Act of 1984. This sixth principle is a logical consequence of the Official Languages Act as it would ensure that the linguistic minorities of Manitoba would be entitled to health care services in the language of their choice, that is, English or French, the two official languages of Canada.

We forget too often that there are francophone communities west of Ontario. Some 45,000 francophones live in my home province of Manitoba. Saint Boniface is one of the largest French communities outside of Quebec. French communities in Manitoba are strong, well structured, and their contribution to the cultural, economic, and social development of our province is significant.

Since 1993 francophones in Manitoba have governed their own school board. The time has come to get the same rights in health care accessibility.

Health care in French is important for the preservation and promotion of Franco-Manitoban communities. Among the many arguments, a good communication between health care professionals and patients is absolutely essential. Many studies confirm the importance of the language in ensuring efficient health care service. Language related obstacles reduce accessibility to and the quality of health care.

The health care professional has to help, guide and advise patients. When communication is good, services are more efficient, there is no time wasted, results are better, and costs are reduced.

Francophones in Manitoba have been working hard for a number of years to ensure the delivery of quality health care and social services in French, but access is still very limited. When such services are offered, their capacity is restricted. The Government of Canada must respect its own constitutional obligations and support francophones by giving them quality of status and equal rights in the field of health care.

The Société franco-manitobaine, SFM, is the spokesgroup for Franco-Manitobans. In March 2002, a little less than a year ago, supported by nearly 50 francophone organizations, the SFM presented its view to the Romanow commission when it came to Winnipeg. The SFM asked Mr. Romanow to recommend to the government the addition of a sixth principle to the Canada Health Act.

Francophones want to see their constitutional rights guaranteed when it comes to health in Manitoba. The Société franco-manitobaine was in complete agreement with the document produced by the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne du Canada, “Health in French: Towards improved access to health care services in French”.

Voting in favour of Bill C-202 would definitely be an advancement of rights for official language minority communities in Canada and it would be an excellent way for the Government of Canada to reaffirm its commitment to enhance the vitality and support the development of Canada's francophone and anglophone minorities as recommended by section 41 of the Official Languages Act.

I am delighted to support Bill C-202 and I recommend it to all members of the House.

[Benoît Sauvageau, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madame Speaker, I am torn—strong words maybe—by this speech, but at least I understand the reasons behind the bill presented by my friend and colleague, the member for Ottawa—Vanier, with whom I had the pleasure and honour to sit on the Standing Committee on Official Languages, along with other colleagues here.

I do not object to the messenger or the message per se, but I will go a little further. When the member for Ottawa—Vanier asks us to amend the Canada Health Act by adding a sixth principle, namely linguistic duality, the goal is noble. My colleague's purpose in introducing this bill is also justified and justifiable.

Where I have a slight problem is with the desired results. We want to offer communities that live in a minority situation—let us call a spade a spade—offer Francophone communities in Canada services in their language, where numbers warrant.

Is the member for Ottawa—Vanier's approach of amending the Canada Health Act to meet this objective of offering services in French to Francophones the right one? The bill would add the following after section 12:

12.1 In order to satisfy the criterion respecting linguistic duality,

(a) as soon as possible, the province shall, in co-operation with the facilities of the province that offer insured health services, develop a program ensuring access to health services for members of the province's anglophone or francophone minority and, in so doing, shall take account of the human, material and financial resources of each facility—

Already we have a problem and this is the reason for the Bloc Quebecois' main objection to this bill. It says “as soon as possible, the province shall, in co-operation with the facilities of the province—”

In fact, it is right. It is the province that must establish the priorities. It is the province which, under the Constitution, under the Health Act, provides services to clients, patients, individuals, and the public. It is up to the provinces to define this.

The bill says “—the province shall, in co-operation with the facilities of the province that offer insured health services—”. In fact, this is a provincial jurisdiction.

Even if we circumvented that, which would cause us no end of pangs, but if we did decided to go ahead anyway, supporting Bill C-202 even if this is a provincial area of jurisdiction, the excuses we used are also available to the provinces. They could tell us, “We are taking into account human, material and financial resources, in not providing access to services as stipulated in clause 12.1”.

I know that it would be fallacious, a misuse of the bill as presented to us, but unfortunately I think these would be the excuses the provinces would come up with. When there is reference to sufficient financial resources and we know that there is a problem everywhere in Canada with health care funding, it seems to me that they will throw the argument of insufficient financial resources back at us.

If I may, I will point out that this bill would be hard to implement in Quebec, not because we are any better than anyone else, nicer, better looking or whatever, but because we have already given some thought to this. I would have liked to have heard some comments on this.

We in Quebec enacted Bill 142 back in 1986—when, I believe, the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Louis was in cabinet—guaranteeing access to health services in English throughout Quebec.

Here is what I would propose to my colleague from Ottawa—Vanier: why do we not work together to promote interprovincial reciprocity agreements based on the principle of Bill 142, which Quebec enacted back in 1986, thereby respecting provincial jurisdictions and saying we merely want the reciprocity of what is the practice in Quebec?

If I wanted to make political hay with this—which I don't—I could draw a parallel with the Young Offenders Act and its implementation in Quebec. The desire was to make blanket changes, and this went over like a lead balloon in Quebec. It is not that we were opposed to preventing youth crime, that we had anything against virtue, or against young offenders, but merely that we had a different approach.

This bill affects me when it states that there will be blanket coverage. If we agree to that, first of all we would be recognizing the first five principles, which are not recognized in Quebec, although applied. If we are to recognize a sixth, we will have to recognize the first five. But what if a seventh, eighth or ninth were to appear later, what would we hear? “You agree with the first six, but not with the other three”. It is a sensitive issue.

In ten years, education might be a serious issue in Canada, it might be such a serious issue that the federal government may want to interfere in the area of education. If we accept it for health, because the situation is so serious, then we might accept it for the environment because it is also experiencing serious problems, just as we accepted for education. What jurisdictions will be left to the provinces? Will they have any areas of responsibility?

The goal my colleague, the member for Ottawa—Vanier, wants to attain is legitimate and worthwhile. We too want to attain this objective, which would allow French speaking communities to be served in their language.

What is Quebec doing, in concrete terms, to help? My colleague from New Brunswick is here. The University of Sherbrooke offers medical courses—he is a doctor, to boot—to students from New Brunswick so that francophones in that province can be served in their language.

There are interprovincial agreements. There is a willingness on Quebec's part. However, I do not think that the way to reach the objective of providing francophones with French language services is by adding a sixth principle. I think this approach sidesteps the problem.

It is perfectly legitimate to raise this for debate in order to propose another approach in the end, and I would like to invite my colleague to consider another approach.

For example, let me give him another suggestion. I was reading in his speech that he has waited five years to introduce his bill. It gives me no pleasure to tell him that we are against the bill, even though we espouse the principle that francophones should have more services in French.

However, I would propose another suggestion: Bill 142. There may be a few others that could apply here, but Bill 142 recognizes provincial jurisdiction. It recognizes that each province must provide, across its territory, services to minorities, in this case, in French.

It is important to remember that the Canada Health Act, created in 1984, has never been recognized. It is applied, but it has never been recognized in Quebec, because it intrudes into areas of provincial jurisdiction.

It is unfortunate to talk in political terms about an issue as sensitive as health, but we have to. I will remind the House that when the last two reports of the Commissioner of Official Languages were tabled, a journalist by the name of Elizabeth Thompson asked me the same question, “Do you want to subject transfers for health to the Official Languages Act?”

I can easily see a province like Saskatchewan, Manitoba or Alberta having its transfer payments in health cut, having problems with hospital waiting lists and so forth, even resulting in some deaths, and then being told that it is because they did not respect the Official Languages Act.

I think this is, I repeat, a sensitive subject, and simplistic solutions should not be provided for complex problems.

The committee is already looking at Part VII of the Official Languages Act. It could be very interesting to see how, in respecting provincial jurisdiction, francophone communities could be encouraged to obtain services.

If there is meddling in this area, I fear that, next, there will be meddling in the environment or education. It is unfortunately for this reason that we want to work to provide services, but in a different way that will, I hope, be as effective for those communities that are truly in dire straits as a result of the government's inaction.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Madam Speaker, I want to say at the outset that I do not want to spend a lot of time speaking about where I and my party stand on the private member's bill that is before us.

Nobody ever suggested that it would be easy to build a modern, progressive, bilingual, multicultural Canada, but I think we have seen a couple of examples tonight of how at least two parties in this Parliament, the official opposition, the Alliance, and the Bloc, make it extremely difficult to achieve. I have to say I am always puzzled by that, knowing and respecting the fact that there are very stringent laws to protect and reinforce the French language, and understandably so in Quebec. It always surprises me that there is so little interest in the whole issue of how to ensure that francophones outside Quebec also have their language, one of Canada's two official languages, fully respected.

Similarly, I always find it depressing that so many Alliance members say, and I do not want to say this applies to everyone, to heck with French or either of the official languages if there are in fact other language needs. Let me say very clearly how important it is to be responsive to those other language needs and nothing in this bill in my view in any way is insensitive to that. We have to be clear about what we are dealing with here.

It is a pleasure for me to speak this evening to Bill C-202, An Act to amend the Canada Health Act (linguistic duality).

My colleague, the hon. member for Acadie—Bathurst, a proud Acadian and a proud francophone, has already spoken in the House on this subject. Tonight, it is a pleasure for me to congratulate and thank the hon. member for Ottawa—Vanier for having proposed such an important initiative for official language minority communities.

This bill includes an important component for official language minority communities, that being linguistic duality in health care services for Canadians.

In this respect, this bill proposes a sixth health care principle. This principle states that Canadian provinces must respect the principle of linguistic duality in health care delivery.

Currently, the Canada Health Act includes five principles that regulate the delivery of health care. These are public administration, comprehensiveness, universality, portability, and accessibility. It is true that these five principles are often sorely tested by the current crisis affecting Canadian health care institutions.

The proposal in the bill is based on the participation of the provinces, which would receive the full transfer payment amount for health in order to respect the principle of linguistic duality within medical institutions.

The provinces must also entrust the management of institutions providing health care to people belonging to the provincial francophone or anglophone minority, where the number of users of the establishment warrant this.

In short, we are talking about linguistic rights. Official language minority communities would have the right to be served in their own language.

The provision of quality care is not just about the ability of medical professionals to provide care, help and advice, but also about their ability to understand and be understood.

This application of the bill is very feasible. Two provinces, New Brunswick and Quebec, have already taken steps in this direction with regard to their health care delivery.

I remember what was said about this in the last Speech from the Throne. I am quoting Her Excellency the Governor General, Adrienne Clarkson.

Linguistic duality is at the heart of our collective identity—It will support the development of minority English- and French-speaking communities, and expand access to services in their language in areas such as health.

In June 2001, a study on access to health care services in French, commissioned by the Consultative Committee for French-Speaking Minority Communities and supported by Health Canada, was done by the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne du Canada.

This study looked at the importance to the effectiveness of certain types of care received of being able to use one's own language. There was considerable research confirming this. Moreover, this study found that anglophones' accessibility to health care is three to seven times greater than of francophones, which is all to the good.

However, much still needs to be done in order for official language minority communities to be able to receive health care services in their own language.

The right to health services in one of the minority languages is not a privilege, but a right that should be ingrained in the mentality of this government and the provinces.

A person should be able to first, obtain health care in his own language, second, understand the directions of a health care provider and third, fully understand the care he is receiving or should receive. None of this should require an uphill battle. Canadians say all the time that access to health care is their number one priority. In my view, the language of communication is a major component of access.

In conclusion, I would like all parliamentarians in this House to imagine being in a hospital where no one spoke or understood theirr language. I guarantee them, they would go through all sorts of emotions and realize that they might receive care without knowing what will be done to you or what exactly their ailment is. Definitely something to think about.

I can only wish one thing in finishing this speech and that is: long live this bill.

[Clifford Lincoln, Liberal, Lac-Saint-Louis, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will keep my remarks very brief. My colleague from New Brunswick Southwest wants to intervene and I want to ensure that I leave him that time.

I was sad while listening to our colleague from Surrey Central, whom I have much esteem for, when he started to throw out percentages, that 4% speak French and 50% speak another language, that more people in Vancouver speak Chinese than French and that more people speak English than French here and there. I think that misses the very heart of the issue.

One of the key characteristics of this country is its duality, the French and English cultures, the French and English languages, the founding cultures. This is what distinguishes Canada as a special country. It has devoted compassion, laws and protection to minority cultures, even when the numbers are very small. I know this has not been observed as faithfully as it could have been and it is why I congratulate my colleague the member for Ottawa—Vanier. He has been so diligent, persistent, committed and convinced about minority languages, cultures and communities in Canada.

The bill comes in time to remind us that of all sectors and institutions, the health sector and the health institutions should care about minority languages and minority cultures.

I have a great deal of respect for my colleague from Repentigny, with whom I have had the opportunity to work with closely, and we both a great deal of respect for each other. However, having said that, I cannot agree with him.

When I read this bill, when I see the words that is uses, I see that it is based on Quebec's Bill 142. I recall the discussions that took place in the National Assembly when that legislation was being considered, I was there. There were my colleagues, Thérèse Lavoie-Roux and Christos Sirros. This bill was supported by all of the parties. Everyone wanted to settle this issue of minority language.

As everyone knows, and I am not saying this to play party politics, but these things become a sort of political game, depending on the minister, the times, and the government in power. That is why it is good that we now have legislation, the Canada Health Act, to settle the matter, not just for New Brunswick, but across the country, that is based at the outset on the premise of provincial jurisdiction.

The legislation states clearly that the province is responsible. That is the key to the act. I do not think that this offends one province or another, or imposes anything, because it is up to the provinces to put this in practice.

It is a praiseworthy objective to ensure that in hospitals, and health institutions above all else, people could obtain health care and could call on someone who understands one of the minority languages.

This bill is praiseworthy and I congratulate my colleague once again for bringing it forward. I hope that we, including my friend from Repentigny and his colleagues, will find a way to back this bill because its objective is very Canadian and it is an objective we should trust and back very strongly.

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Madam Speaker, I am glad I was able to hear the member for Lac-Saint-Louis and his reflective comments that are always right on target as we would expect from the member. I appreciate him allowing me to have a few moments to reflect on Bill C-202.

I wish to congratulate the member for Ottawa—Vanier, but I will take some credit for helping the bill to the floor of the House of Commons. I am one of those who signed on in that process.

The intentions of the member are good. We are encouraged by what he is attempting to do. I do not have to remind the Speaker nor the House that I come from Canada's only officially bilingual province. This linguistic duality as it pertains to health care is something that we have been striving to achieve. We have had great success in New Brunswick. We would hope to see that across the country if the bill were passed by the House.

I will throw out some questions to the member. I know we will have another hour for debate. The member will most likely address those concerns and possibly already has.

Looking at the bill, this would in fact bring a change to the Canada Health Act by adding a sixth principle in respect to linguistic duality. I will read a summary of the bill so that my constituents back home will know exactly what the bill does. It says:

This enactment amends the Canada Health Act so as to ensure that payment of the full cash contribution under the Canada Health and Social Transfer is subject to the obligation for each province to respect the principle of linguistic duality.

This is what the bill would do as we understand it.

If we look through some of the language in the bill, and the member could speak to this, perhaps it has to be tightened up. In my opinion it has to be made more doable.

We are all attempting to change the Canada Health Act and add new principles to it. I know as a party the Progressive Conservative Party has suggested that the sixth principle of the Canada health Act should be stable long term predictable funding. Then the provinces would know in fact how much money they would have to deliver health care across the country. The provinces have not had this.

The reason I point that out is because we know what the Prime Minister and the federal government recently went through with the provinces in terms of this last health care accord and the difficulty of achieving an accord that everyone could agree with. I am saying this because there are still some financial restraints on the system.

Some of the phrasing in the proposed section 12.1(a) of Bill C-202 that I am not comfortable with reads:

(a) as soon as possible, the province shall, in co-operation with the facilities of the province that offer insured health services, develop a program ensuring access to health services for members of the province's anglophone or francophone minority and, in so doing, shall take account of the human, material and financial resources of each facility--

And so on. That is the concern that I have.

It appears to me as if the provinces could use that as an escape clause for not achieving the objectives that the bill wants to achieve. In other words, the duality issue is contingent upon their financial resources.

If those financial resources are not there, and in some cases they are not, the province simply could look at the amendment to the Canada Health Act and say that the bill states that financial resources of each facility have to be taken into account in order to offer linguistic duality. My concern is that they could use that against the bill. Maybe the member could speak to that.

Finally, proposed section 12.1(c) of the bill states:

as soon as possible, the province shalltake action to ensure that the managementof any facility in the province that offersinsured health services is placed entirely inthe hands of members of the province’sanglophone or francophone minority, where the number of users from the anglophoneor francophone minority is sufficientto warrant that action.

I just want clarification on that. I guess we need to have a definition of that word “sufficient”, because again we do not want to have the ability for a province to opt out, which we often see if we do not have tightly worded legislation. This is another concern that should be raised.

In terms of what the member is trying to achieve with the bill, we do support it. We are encouraged by the bill. We want to see this type of legislation enacted and endorsed by all provinces. Our only thought, when we get into that final hour of debate on the bill, is that the member could flesh out some of these details so that the bill will survive the close scrutiny it will come under in each and every one of the provinces. We support the bill in principle. Maybe the member might have a minute to sum up on some of those points we have made.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Madam Speaker, on a point of order. I believe that if you were to seek it, you would find unanimous consent that the time provided for consideration of private members' business has now expired for today.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

Does the House give its unanimous consent to say that it is 7.03 p.m.?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

The time provided for the consideration of private members' business has now expired and the order is dropped to the bottom of the order of precedence on the Order Paper.

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

[Howard Hilstrom, Canadian Alliance, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Madam Speaker, according to the rules of the House, we have one issue with which to deal. It arises out of a question that I asked in question period before Christmas. The answer I received was less than full. As a result, I want to raise it again to give the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage an opportunity to expand on the answer and more clearly state what the government's position is.

This concerns the loss of the tuberculosis free status for the Province of Manitoba with regard to our cattle industry in particular. The loss of that status impacts on trade with other provinces as well as the United States. It is very important for Manitoba to regain that TB free status. That is the issue. It is not a question of food safety. Food going out of Manitoba from all livestock, including elk, bison, deer, is not in question. It is a question of animal disease control, and in the case of tuberculosis, it has to be eradicated.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency will go to a ranch where a domestic cattle herd has been identified as having tuberculosis and literally will have all the animals destroyed. That eliminates the disease. The farm or ranch is ultimately repopulated with a clean herd and the business continues on, with no re-infection.

In Manitoba the elk in the area of the Riding Mountain National Park, which comes under the heritage minister's purview in the House, are a reservoir for tuberculosis. When the elk leave the park, they interact with the cattle herds in the surrounding district. There are about 50,000 cattle in the immediate area, so there is quite a bit of contact. The elk herds re-infect the clean cattle herds. The problem is that Agriculture Canada and the CFI are cleaning up the cattle herds but nobody is cleaning up the elk herd inside the Riding Mountain National Park.

The point of my question is why does the plan, which has been developed by Heritage Canada, Agriculture Canada, the Province of Manitoba and the local municipalities, not have in it a specific proactive effort to eradicate the disease from wild elk. Part of the plan is to increase the number of hunting licences and have hunters reduce the number of elk.

There are about 4,000 to 4,500 elk inside the park. Everybody knows and agrees that is the reservoir for the disease. However in this last hunting season of 2002, there were approximately 260 animals taken by hunters. These animals were from all around the park, not just in the hot zones, which are the places where the elk come out and contaminate cattle herds.

Hunting will not reduce the number of elk down to the target level, which I believe the government has said would be about 2,500. There have been 260 taken by hunters, with maybe a few more yet to come. That will not do it.

My question to the Minister of Canadian Heritage is this. Why is something proactive not being done to reduce the number of diseased elk inside the park?

[Carole-Marie Allard, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Selkirk—Interlake for his question, which provides me with the opportunity to further elaborate on the role of Parks Canada in dealing with tuberculosis in the elk population.

Parks Canada acknowledges the gravity of the situation involving TB in wild species and cattle in and around the Riding Mountain National Park. Parks Canada will continue to address the threat this disease represents for the ecological integrity and socio-economic situation of the area.

Bovine tuberculosis is a non-native disease in wildlife in Canada. It was introduced into the Riding Mountain area by infected cattle in the early 1900s. There has been sporadic control of the disease since then on a case by case basis. By 1986, it was considered eradicated from Manitoba's cattle. In 1991, however, bovine tuberculosis was again detected in cattle, in a herd near the Riding Mountain National Park. In 1992, it was found for the first time in wild elk. Over the past 11 years, five cattle herds in the area have tested positive for bovine tuberculosis, leading to the destruction of twelve herds in all. Ten wild elk have tested positive since 1997, as has one white-tailed deer.

Parks Canada has been actively working to resolve this problem since the disease was detected in wild animals in 1992. Staff at Parks Canada are collaborating with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the Departments of Conservation and Agriculture and Food of Manitoba to provide on-site laboratory services at the park to detect the disease in wild animals. Technicians have tested more than 2,500 elk, moose and deer carcasses. Only 11 specimens tested positive for bovine tuberculosis. Given the results, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has concluded that the disease is still a threat, but a very low level one, to the elk population in the Mont Riding ecosystem.

Parks Canada is well aware of the impact that this disease is having and can have on Manitoba's livestock industry. Although elk populations are not under immediate threat from bovine tuberculosis, it could have a negative impact on the well-being of animals in that area, including elk.

Given the potential impact, Parks Canada has taken various measures to manage the situation.

For instance, it has taken an active role in the implementation of a bovine tuberculosis management program in Manitoba. This five-year program was developed by a inter-agency technical committee on wildlife, including representatives from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Manitoba Agriculture and Food, Manitoba Conservation, and Parks Canada.

Lastly, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada has also become an active member of the committee. The Manitoba Cattle Producers Association and the Manitoba Wildlife Federation have also joined the committee and benefit government agencies with their valuable knowledge on the subject.

The main elements of the plan—

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

I am sorry to interrupt the hon. parliamentary secretary, but she has run out of time. The hon. member for Selkirk—Interlake.

[Howard Hilstrom, Canadian Alliance, Selkirk—Interlake, MB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the parliamentary secretary bringing that information forward.

We know there is a plan but the cattle producers were not consulted sufficiently on this. I point out that the Manitoba Cattle Producers Association has stated that the plan put forward by the various government agencies will not work because it will not proactively reduce the number of elk inside that park. The numbers are so great that the elk herd will continue to carry the disease and, if there are too many elk inside the park for the amount of habitat, the elk will leave the park looking for food. It may be only 1 out of 100 or 1 out of 500 of the elk that have TB but they will go along with the rest of the herd and the disease will spread to local cattle.

The ranchers and cattle producers were not been fully listened to, including their representatives at the Manitoba Cattle Producers Association. They would have liked to have had their recommendation that the hot spots, where the disease is known to exist in greater percentage--

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage.

[Carole-Marie Allard, Liberal, Laval East, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to add that the measures we are taking are documented in the implementation plan for the Bovine TB Management Program. This information is available on the website of Manitoba's Ministry of Conservation.

A technical interagency committee is responsible publicizing the testing protocol, results, strategies and activities to local and provincial stakeholder groups. These groups are the Riding Mountain Liaison Committee, the Manitoba Wildlife Federation and the Manitoba Cattle Producers Association.

Parks Canada is continuing to take part in developing these strategies and has launched scientific projects. The first is a four-year study on elk migration. The second is an elk habitat study. The third involves staff from Riding Mountain National Park helping local livestock farmers build barrier fencing. The fourth project has Parks Canada sharing scientific information with Manitoba's Ministry of Conservation.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)]

The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted.

Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

(The House adjourned at 7:11 p.m.)