Mr. Speaker, the first question asked on the SARS issue in the House came from this party, me personally, on March 21 when I put the question to the health minister and the response came from her parliamentary secretary. We knew from the get-go that Canada was in trouble on this file. I want to go back to exactly how the parliamentary secretary, on instructions from the Minister of Health, answered that question.
I wanted to know what we were doing as a country to contain and control that disease. Quoting directly from Hansard of March 21 of this year, this is what the parliamentary secretary said on behalf of the Minister of Health:
We know that it is not a real threat because the virus has been traced back to Hong Kong. There have only been a few cases in Canada that have come from there.
We know it is a real threat. We know that the Government of Canada has not handled it well at all, the reason being that there was a total lack of leadership on this file.
You have heard this speech before, Mr. Speaker, because you were in the chair the other night when we had an emergency debate on SARS. That emergency debate was not brought to the floor of the House by the government nor any of the other opposition parties in the House. That emergency debate was brought to the floor of the House of Commons by the Progressive Conservative Party, by me personally, as the health critic.
The Prime Minister takes great delight in pointing down into this corner and saying that the fifth party in the House of Commons is the smallest party, and he is absolutely right. We are the smallest party. However we took this issue seriously and we wanted it brought to the floor of the House of Commons. We were the ones who forced that debate on the floor of the House of Commons.
Until that night, the Minister of Health never stood in her place to take responsibility for that issue. She simply did not do that. She was basically hiding on the issue. She was hiding on the most critical health issue probably in the history of Canada. The minister was not to be seen. I am not making this up as I go along. Her own cabinet colleague confirmed she was in hiding.
In addition to the health minister being in hiding, the Prime Minister himself was on an extended golf vacation in South America. There is an old expression that when the going gets tough, the tough get going, but with the Prime Minister, the expression is, when the going gets tough, the tough go golfing. There was an absolute absence of leadership on this file.
I am looking forward to hearing how the parliamentary secretary will respond this evening. I want him to specifically explain his statement when he told us in the House on March 21 that it was “not a real threat”. How could it be anything but a real threat when there is no cure, when there is only containment and control, none of which the Government of Canada exercised?