Mr. Speaker, it is not very complicated. We are looking at a fiscal imbalance. This afternoon, a question by my colleague from Joliette expressed it very clearly.
For this year—we saw the example yesterday—there are four provinces in Canada that have brought down budgets. They are running a deficit of $5 billion. In the meantime, the federal government has a $7 billion surplus.
If this were accidental it would not be so bad. However, it was a deliberate decision by this government to starve the provinces so that they would no longer have the means to assume their responsibilities in health. At the end of the day, the government gets to impose its standards and its way of doing things. Yet, the Liberal government, the federal government, could not be any more inefficient when it comes to assuming its own responsibilities in health.
It is obvious that we would be much better off in a system with only one government to collect taxes and be accountable to all citizens. That would be the best solution. I agree that would be preferable. We could see the effectiveness of the system.
At present, the Quebec government is a federalist Liberal government. Their Minister of Finance, Mr. Séguin, Minister of Health, Mr. Couillard, and all stakeholders in the health field in Quebec have said the same thing. They have worked hard to remedy the situation. They have worked hard to find solutions. What is lacking is federal government money.
Last year the federal government decided to put $2 billion into health care, as requested by the provinces. That was spent in 2003-04. For 2004-05, instead of representing 16% of expenditures for health, the federal share of funding will be 14.5%. We must not be hesitant about bringing this to the public's attention. The Prime Minister is engaged in advertising campaigns about what a priority health is for him. In the reality of the budget for next year, the one we are examining, there will be less for health than in past budgets. This is an absolutely unacceptable situation.
There must be an end to all this. The Prime Minister says one thing but does another. This is behaviour the people of Quebec and of Canada can no longer accept. If ever the federal government does not put in the money required, there will be time to finalize adoption of the budget. With the $2 billion, he is holding the public hostage for the next election. This is absolutely aberrant and unacceptable.
I challenge the hon. member to go and ask each province to admit they are not doing all they can with their funding. It is not Quebec separatists who are calling for money for health care but the governments of all the provinces, the stakeholders in all the provincial health networks, and the physicians' and nurses' federations. All these people cannot be wrong, and only the federal government right.