Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the member a couple of questions and make a comment. He talks about going back to 1992. I must admit I am quite proud to represent a riding where, in 1988, the member from Surrey North was I think one of the first to raise this in the legislature when he spoke of labelling bottles of alcohol for that very reason. I am very proud to carry on that tradition from the NDP in Surrey North.
I have held in my arms newborn babies going through withdrawal. Anybody who has ever seen that will take any action they can to make sure that never happens again to any infant.
There are three things that I would ask the member to comment on.
First, is the federal government providing through its health transfer enough programs for people who have alcohol addictions to get into treatment? In my province, I know there are women who have young children and are anxious to go into addiction treatment programs. They may become pregnant, but there is no place they can go, except for one place that has not opened yet; it is at risk of not opening as a result of the Conservatives' movement on child care. These women will not leave their young children behind and they cannot take them with them. I am interested in the member's comment on whether he thinks there are adequate health transfer payments for programs for potential moms or moms with their children to get treatment.
Second, I would ask if he thinks there should be mandatory reporting of FAS-FAE, not by name but so that we have a sense of trend across the country, because one of my concerns is that we do not have accurate information across the country. I was one of the members on the health committee who raised the issue. It was clear to me, anyway, that Health Canada had not been very interested in taking action since the former report.
Third, I would like to ask the member if he has any sense of the amount of dollars spent by the provinces on children. Many of these children are not raised by their birth parents. They are raised in foster care or adopted. I would ask the member whether he thinks there should be funding resources allocated to adoptive parents to support them in raising children.