House of Commons Hansard #150 of the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was safety.
Government Response to PetitionsRoutine Proceedings
Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre Saskatchewan
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski ConservativeParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to eight petitions.
James Rajotte Conservative Edmonton—Leduc, AB
Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Finance in relation to Bill C-43, A Second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 11, 2014 and other measures.
The committee has studied the bill and has decided to report the bill back to the House, with amendment.
François Choquette NDP Drummond, QC
Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development in relation to supplementary estimates (B) 2014-15.
Robert Sopuck Conservative Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB
moved for leave to introduce Bill C-637, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (firearms storage and transportation).
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise today to introduce my private member's bill, an act to amend the Criminal Code, firearms storage and transportation, for first reading this morning.
The bill would amend certain provisions of the Criminal Code and the Firearms Act in order to better define low-velocity barrelled weapons, which are not firearms.
(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)
Questions on the Order PaperRoutine Proceedings
Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre Saskatchewan
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski ConservativeParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Mr. Speaker, Question No. 750 will be answered today.
Ralph Goodale Liberal Wascana, SK
With regard to the Minister of Transport’s commitment on April 23, 2014 to “immediately remov[e] the least crash-resistant DOT-111 tank cars from dangerous goods service by directing the phase-out of tank cars that have no continuous reinforcement of their bottom shell”: (a) how many of these tank cars remained in service in each month since last April; (b) when does the government expect this phase-out to be complete; (c) what constraints limit the government’s ability to complete the phase-out; and (d) have any of these tank cars been involved in accidents since last April, and if so, where and when?
Question No. 750Questions on the Order PaperRoutine Proceedings
Essex Ontario
Conservative
Jeff Watson ConservativeParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport
Mr. Speaker, with regard to (a), on April 23, 2014, under the authority of the Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act, Transport Canada issued protective direction 34, requiring the immediate phase-out of the least crash-resistant DOT-111 tank cars from dangerous goods service. These are the tank cars that are not equipped with continuous bottom reinforcement, posing a much higher risk of failure in a derailment.
Some tank cars in North America do not enter Canada and are therefore not subject to protective direction 34. Some 2,879 tank cars were reported to Transport Canada as having been removed from dangerous goods service in Canada, and the phase-out is now complete.
With regard to (b), industry was given 30 days in which to remove these cars from dangerous goods service in Canada, and the phase-out is now complete. Thirty-one empty cars, which were unable to clean and purge residue product within the 30 days, have been given “Notices to remedy Non-compliance” and directed to a location for cleaning and purging prior to being repurposed, or removal to the US.
With regard to (c), phase-out of service is complete/not applicable.
With regard to (d), none of these DOT-111 tank cars that have no continuous reinforcement of their bottom shell, whose reporting marks are on file with Transport Canada, has been identified as being involved in any TDG incident since April. All owners of these affected tank cars have identified their cars, using the unique reporting mark in the North American database of railway cars, UMLER. Rail carriers use this database to identify cars that cannot be used in dangerous goods service. Further, transport of dangerous goods inspectors verify at the scene of an incident that any cars involved are not subject to the protective direction.
Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings
Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre Saskatchewan
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski ConservativeParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Mr. Speaker, if Question No. 747 could be made an order for return, this return would be tabled immediately.
Chrystia Freeland Liberal Toronto Centre, ON
With regard to government funding, for each fiscal year since 2007-2008 inclusive: (a) what are the details of all grants, contributions, and loans to any organization, body, or group in the electoral district of Toronto Centre, providing for each (i) the name of the recipient, (ii) the location of the recipient, indicating the municipality, (iii) the date, (iv) the amount, (v) the department or agency providing it, (vi) the program under which the grant, contribution, or loan was made, (vii) the nature or purpose; and (b) for each grant, contribution and loan identified in (a), was a press release issued to announce it and, if so, what is the (i) date, (ii) headline, (iii) file number of the press release?
(Return tabled)
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
Mr. Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.
Motion
Libby Davies NDP Vancouver East, BC
moved:
That, in the opinion of the House: (a) full support should be offered to survivors of thalidomide; (b) the urgent need to defend the rights and dignity of those affected by thalidomide should be recognized; and (c) the government should provide support to survivors, as requested by the Thalidomide Survivors Taskforce.
Mr. Speaker, first I would like to start by saying that I will be sharing my time with the member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert.
I am very honoured to rise in the House today to speak to this very important and historic motion from the NDP.
The motion before us calls on the government to right the wrong of the tragic consequences that took place, when, in 1961, the Government of Canada approved the sale of thalidomide as a safe drug for the treatment of morning sickness for pregnant women. It is so important today that we speak out collectively and with one voice, as Parliament, to understand and to address this urgent and tragic issue.
I would like to thank the member for Outremont, the leader of the official opposition, for agreeing to and giving his full support to this motion being brought forward today. I would also like to thank members from all sides because we now know that the government will be supporting this motion with a slight amendment. I am very thankful for that. We have had a lot of discussion. It is historic and important that today we will be speaking in this debate, and we will be bringing forward the visibility of this issue. I hope that on Monday we will be voting on this motion and that it will be a unanimous vote.
On Tuesday, I had the honour to be joined, with my colleague from Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, by two members of the thalidomide survivors task force. Mercédes Benegbi and Josée Lake came from Montreal to join us in a press conference, where they spoke and shared some of their experiences of what it has been like, over more than 50 years, to be a thalidomide survivor. It was very moving to hear their words and to hear them speak about their deeply personal experience, and of the experience of 95 survivors in Canada. Hearing what they had to say is a day that I will not forget.
I am also very thankful that the people at The Globe and Mail decided to focus on this issue. We saw the original story that they did last Saturday, which was a very comprehensive piece. It gave us the history and background, and brought us to the current situation today, with so many survivors living in pain and suffering and with great financial hardship. To me, it was one of those moments when a whole bunch of things came together. We have to recognize that the thalidomide survivors have for 50-plus years been living in a way that has been quite invisible.
It is a story that we are aware of. I remember when we debated Bill C-17 in the House, on drug safety, a bill that we supported. I remember that when I debated that bill in the House, I mentioned the history of thalidomide. I did not know then that a few months later we would actually be debating the issue of thalidomide. There is some continuity here, and some historical importance to what we are doing. Of course, drug safety in this country is critically important, and although we would have liked to see some improvements to it, the bill that was passed a few months ago was a very important bill.
When we look at history and see what has taken place in this country around drug safety, and we look at this terrible tragic situation that took place in the early 1960s, it is so compelling. It speaks to the core of why we are here. As parliamentarians and legislators, we need to pay attention and ensure that there is proper regulatory oversight for drug safety.
When this drug was first brought on to the market in the early sixties, it was deemed to be safe. The tragedy is that when the story began to unfold and the consequences began to be known about women who had miscarriages and babies being born with terrible deformities, Canada was very slow to react. It took decades, right up until 1991, for there to be even some discussion around compensation.
If we look at the amount of compensation that was given in 1991, we can see how terribly inadequate the small settlements were to the survivors. It really did nothing to help them. They even had to sign gag orders that they would not speak out afterward. The small settlements they got in no way dealt with the long-term effects of what they were dealing with.
We know today that the consequences of thalidomide have left people dealing with very severe and debilitating pain. It has taken 50 years of work, which has taken a toll on them, not only emotionally and financially, but of course physically. Many of the survivors are now suffering from nerve damage and painful wear and tear on their bodies. It has caused enormous challenges for them, including the loss of the ability to use their limbs to care for themselves, and damage to their spines and joints, which severely limits their mobility. It has impacted on their ability to gain employment. It means that they have often had to depend on others for very basic tasks, such as using the toilet, dressing, preparing meals, doing all of the daily things we take for granted.
Fifty years later, with this group of people who are aging, the health consequences of what they face have become even more serious. It is critical that we not lose more time. There are only 95 thalidomide survivors left in Canada. I believe there were originally about 120 people; some have already died. As these survivors age, their health and financial needs will only grow.
Time is of the essence, and it is very important that we take a stand today and that Parliament speak out. New Democrats call on the government to right the wrong and immediately sit down with the survivors task force to begin the work to arrive at a just settlement for the survivors. That is what this motion would accomplish if it is passed. I want to stress that time is of the essence. We cannot lose another day, week, or year.
There are some precedents in terms of what other countries have done. For example, the government in the United Kingdom is providing regular payments to survivors. Germany offered a one-time lump sum payment. The thalidomide survivors task force is asking the government to sit down and work with it in creating a program that would provide a one-time payment to address people's immediate needs, as well as ongoing payments that would assist individuals based on their own individual circumstances. It is something that needs to be done based on individual needs.
I have had a lot emails over the last couple of days, and I want to refer to one from a former colleague, Penny Priddy, who was a member of Parliament for Surrey. She wrote:
It was the summer of 1963 and I was working at HSC/Sick Kids in Toronto. Her name was “Maria”. She was about a year old. [...]
“Maria” was born without arms. [...] Her legs were not able to support any weight. Her mother had taken thalidomide. [...]
Given what we know, I expect her life was filled with challenges and barriers that required a strength that many of us cannot begin to imagine. [...]
Thank you...for listening to the voices of all of the Marias' who were victims of a system that was so rushed to get a questionable drug to market that they did not consider the unthinkable legacy that they were creating for its smallest citizens.
Today, with this motion, we have an opportunity to right that wrong, and I thank all members of the House who will be supporting it.
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Party's health critic has actually been fairly clear on the issue. We support what is before us today.
We recognize that, as has been pointed out, there are a couple of other countries in the world that attempted to deal with this and have come up with some form of resolution. We also need to recognize that it is a very sad story. This is a medication that was actually deemed safe for use. Unfortunately, sadly, it literally destroyed the lives of not only the individuals directly affiliated with the drug itself but also the family members and so forth. It has caused a great deal of harm.
It is only natural that we look at the survivor task force, meet, and have discussions to see what we can do to come up some sort of a resolution for further justice on the issue.
Could the member provide more comment with respect to the impact this drug, thalidomide, has had on families and communities that were directly affected?
Libby Davies NDP Vancouver East, BC
Mr. Speaker, my colleague is entirely correct that, of course, when we look at this issue, we are looking at an impact on a great number of people.
There are the thalidomide survivors themselves, but there are also their families. We know that one of the issues is that, as the survivors age, they are facing the prospect of their parents, who may have cared for them, passing away. They are being left in circumstances that can be isolated and difficult.
We can imagine the burden of worrying about caregiving and who will be there to assist. The burden on the families has been enormous. We even have to think of the families in which maybe the victim who took thalidomide has already passed away, and what those families went through over 50-plus years now.
We can begin to dig into this issue and think about it. While we all live active lives and those of us who are members of Parliament live in a very privileged position, by and large, these thalidomide survivors and their families, through no fault of their own, have lived in extraordinarily difficult circumstances, medically and financially and emotionally. It compels us to take this responsibility, collectively, to right the wrong.
I know that is what we are here to do today.
Elizabeth May Green Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to support the motion by the hon. member, the NDP health critic, my dear friend, who has brought this issue forward.
Yesterday at the press conference she said this is a non-partisan issue, and I could not agree more. It is made even more non-partisan by the fact that we now know, from comments on the front page of The Globe and Mail, that the Prime Minister recognizes that a wrong has been done and that we, collectively, in this place want to right the wrong.
Children suffered the effects of thalidomide, which never should have been registered in Canada. A Canadian-born public health authority, Dr. Kelsey, stopped its registration in the U.S.
The idea that these victims of thalidomide, one of the iconic horror stories of the pharmaceutical industry, still lack compensation was a surprise to me. I have to say that I feel I am up to date on the wrongs of this land, but in this case I found out through The Globe and Mail, which I think is unusual. We should give credit to journalism, credit to the official opposition, and credit to the Prime Minister and to the spirit of non-partisanship that will today see us right that wrong.
Libby Davies NDP Vancouver East, BC
Mr. Speaker, the member was at the press conference on Tuesday. I certainly appreciate her support and her words here today.
The story in The Globe and Mail, when it came out, was terribly important. As I said earlier, this is an issue that we have all heard about. We have even mentioned it in debate, in different circumstances
To actually examine the details and the history of what took place is something that is very revealing. It is something that we actually need to learn from, in terms of not only drug safety but how we treat people in our society.
I do think the other element of this motion today is that it is an expression that we cannot leave people in such desperate circumstances. We have to show compassion. We live in a society that should stand for social justice and should stand for ending discrimination and pain and suffering.
For many reasons, on many levels, this motion today is very important. I thank the member for her support.
Djaouida Sellah NDP Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC
Mr. Speaker, in 1961, the largest drug-related scandal the world had ever known erupted. It was learned that thalidomide, a drug prescribed to expectant mothers to treat morning sickness, had tragic side effects. Thalidomide was responsible for birth defects and killed thousands of newborns. In 1961, the drug was taken off the market in Germany and Great Britain.
Despite those revelations and the fact that the drug was pulled off shelves in some countries, it was sold in Canada until May 1962, six months after it was taken off the market elsewhere. Today, there are 95 survivors in Canada. The survivors have lived for decades with the consequences of thalidomide, experiencing acute, debilitating pain. In many cases, their health care needs surpass the capacities of the provincial health care systems.
It is sad to see that, after 50 years of fighting, these victims of botched legislation are still having to fight alone to cover the very high costs of their disability. It is in that context that the hon. member for Vancouver East moved this motion calling on the government to make restitution and commit to supporting the thalidomide survivors.
I am honoured to rise today to participate in this debate and support my colleague's motion. I know she does amazing work. Yesterday, we had an opportunity to meet two incredible people who live with the challenges of thalidomide side effects every day. I found their stories so touching. As a doctor, I cannot stand knowing that patients are living with pain and do not even have the help they need to find comfort and feel supported.
Thalidomide survivors in Canada have fared less well than their counterparts in other countries. Thalidomide victims have been forced to fend for themselves, family by family. Not one has benefited from a court ruling. Families have had to make do with an out-of-court settlement that required them to submit to a gag provision prohibiting them from discussing the amount of the settlement. Widely varying amounts were offered as compensation, and people with the same degree of disability received settlements that differed by hundreds of thousands of dollars. That is scandalous considering that in Germany, the United Kingdom and even Spain, subsidy programs are in place to provide financial support to sick people.
The government will say that in 1991, through the extraordinary assistance plan, the Minister of Health granted lump sum payments. However, the amounts were so paltry that they were quickly used up to cover some of the very high costs incurred by survivors.
What are Canada's 95 thalidomide survivors getting today? Nothing. They are getting nothing. While we are giving victims nothing, the United Kingdom gives $80,000 a year. It is up to the government to roll up its sleeves and have a closer look at some programs that could be introduced. Survivors need support and compensation, and they need it now.
The NDP believes that the federal government needs to show leadership when it comes to health.
We know that this Conservative government does not view Canadians' health as a priority, but it has an opportunity here in the House today to do the right thing and help a group of Canadians in need.
Given that this is not a partisan issue and it directly affects the quality of life and daily suffering of nearly 100 survivors of the side effects of thalidomide, I move, seconded by the member for Laval—Les Îles:
That the motion be amended by replacing the words “as requested by” with the words “in partnership with”.
The Deputy Speaker NDP Joe Comartin
It is my duty to inform hon. members that an amendment to an opposition motion may be moved only with the consent of the sponsor of the motion. Therefore, I ask the hon. member for Vancouver East if she consents to this amendment being moved.
The hon. member for Vancouver East.
Libby Davies NDP Vancouver East, BC
Mr. Speaker, I agree.
I would like to thank my colleague, the member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert for her very wonderful comments today and also for moving the amendment.
The amendment is important. We have held some discussions with the government, and I think the wording that is now being presented as an amendment would allow a better opportunity for the government to respond to the thalidomide survivors task force. I thank the hon. member for moving the amendment today in the House.
I have a comment and a question for the hon. member.
It seems to me that, for thalidomide survivors, the issue of daily living is critically important. There are clearly medical challenges, and the member pointed out in her speech that some of these medical challenges might even be beyond the regular nature of the health care system. It may well be that we will need to have special interventions.
I wonder if the member could speak a little more about some of the daily issues and concerns that have emerged for thalidomide survivors who are finding is so difficult to cope on a daily basis. I think the article in The Globe and Mail laid this out very carefully, and I wonder if the member could comment on that.
Djaouida Sellah NDP Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Vancouver East for the incredible work she has done for the survivors of the tragedy due to the side effects of thalidomide and the delay in taking this drug off the shelves here in Canada.
As the hon. member just said in her question, this is a tragedy. I am well aware of the side effects. I want to apologize to the sensitive among us and to those watching, but I can mention one side effect in particular that I saw among the survivors who came to our press conference yesterday. One woman had what is referred to as phocomelia. The root of the word phocomelia is “phoco” from the Greek for “seal”. A person with phocomelia might have their hands attached at their shoulders or their feet attached at their hips.
That is just one example. Some were born without arms or without upper limbs or lower limbs, or with just one lung. Imagine the pain and suffering these people experience and how tough it is for them to perform daily tasks such as getting dressed, eating or getting around. What is more, the tragedy now is that the average age of the survivors is 50. They used to get help from their parents, but those parents are now dead or quite old. The survivors therefore have no quality of life and they are suffering.
Today, the Canadian government must compensate these people and give them the financial means to live in dignity.