Debates of Nov. 5th, 2026

Connected Care for Canadians Act

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec Centre, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would also like to point out that my colleague herself has also served as health minister and that she contributed to moving this program forward. I tried, to the best of my ability, to follow her example and continue to push it ahead. Indeed, the bill was nearly finished when I was in the post. Things have changed since then.

The good news is that the new Minister of Health is very committed to moving it forward, and rightly so.

The provinces and territories have consistently emphasized the importance of working with the Canadian government because big tech operates across several provinces at once. It is easier, as a country, with the provinces and the Canadian government working together, to put enough pressure on those companies to ensure they do not block the data that is important to patients.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for his intervention today, particularly given that in 2022, when he was minister of health, there was an agreement between John Horgan and Justin Trudeau for health-sharing information. I asked the then minister for some information about privacy, and his office did send a response. I could read it one way, or I could flip it around and read it a different way, so it was good political communication.

Why do we still have the problem in this country that health records cannot be shared between provinces securely?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, Québec Centre, QC]

Mr. Speaker, since I have to be very brief, I will thank the member for his continuous advocacy. He knows there has been progress over the years, but he also knows really well that we need more progress in order to support all provinces and territories, regardless of where Canadians live, in their ability to access and benefit from the health data that is so important to them.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think there is broad agreement in this place about the problem this bill is trying to address. Canadians should be able to access their own health information, and when they seek care, the people treating them should be able to get the information they need securely and with the appropriate privacy protections.

I support interoperability. In fact, I have spoken about this in the House before. In the previous Parliament, the former member for Cypress Hills—Grasslands brought forward Bill C-294. It dealt with the Copyright Act and interoperability, and it eventually became law. I congratulate that member, and I spoke in favour of it at the time.

The example I used in that debate was pretty straightforward. It was about a farmer who could own a tractor or combine and buy an implement made by a different manufacturer. It could hook up just fine. Mechanically, there would be no reason it should not work, but technological protection measures could prevent the two pieces of equipment from communicating with each other.

I said at the time, “real competition pits products and services against one another, rewarding innovation and productivity, not copyright and exclusivity.” I also said that the right to interoperability was critical for consumers. I stand by that. I still believe it today. However, health care is obviously different and considerably more complicated.

I want to be very clear: I believe in the importance of interoperability. Canadians should be able to access their personal medical information, and health care professionals should be able to get the information they need to care for their patients safely and with respect for privacy.

However, we need to make a distinction: Making software interoperable and making our health care system truly interoperable are two different things. I have some concerns in this regard about this bill.

Bill S-5 is principally about health information technology vendors. It would require the technology covered by the legislation to be interoperable according to established requirements, and it would prohibit data blocking by vendors. Those sound like very reasonable objectives to me. If a vendor is deliberately preventing health information from moving simply to keep a customer locked into its ecosystem, there is a legitimate role for Parliament, but I think we need to be careful about what happens next.

Canada does not just have one health system. We have provincial health care systems, and within those systems, there are health authorities, hospitals, laboratories, primary care providers and other organizations that have brought in different technologies at different times under different contracts to do different things. Some of those systems are relatively new; some are not. Some communicate reasonably well, and some require people to find workarounds just to move fairly basic information. If there were one health care system, one purchaser and one set of specifications, establishing common technical requirements might be simpler, but there is not.

I do not think the answer is to turn the federal government into the health care technology purchaser for the entire country, although I am sure there are some members on the opposite side who would enjoy that. Health care is principally administered and delivered by the provinces, like it or not. The federal government needs to respect that.

I will be fair about the legislation. There are provisions in the bill that recognize that reality. The federal requirements would not simply apply uniformly, regardless of what a province or territory is already doing. The bill would provide a mechanism that takes into account whether a province or territory has a substantially similar or stronger requirement.

I think that is completely sensible, but it also points to a larger problem. The federal government does not run the health care system. I hope we can all agree on that. Some Canadians might reasonably respond that they are not entirely convinced the provinces are running it either. We have seen in Nova Scotia and, more recently, in my home province of British Columbia that the Conservatives of those provinces actively ran for and won majority governments despite the old logic that Conservatives cannot speak to health care issues and only run away.

In my home province, there are wait times at the ER, that is if it is actually open. I heard from the daughter of 90-year-old woman that her mother had been kept in the hallway of the Kelowna General Hospital ER for days. She was literally unable to sleep with all the incoming patients, and the first responders and health care professionals trying to do their job while her mother was waiting for a bed.

Constitutionally and practically, the provinces administer and deliver health care regardless of how badly. They are dealing with hospitals, health authorities, physicians and procurement decisions, and much of the information is already in place. Therefore, I think this House should ask a fairly basic question: Why should we assume that the federal government knows best when it comes to procuring and implementing complex information technology when its own record does not exactly inspire confidence?

Let me give an example. We all remember ArriveCAN. The Auditor General of Canada could not even determine exactly what the application cost because the government's financial records and controls were so poor. She estimated the cost at approximately $59.5 million. She found that federal organizers repeatedly failed to follow good management practices in contracting, development and implementation, and concluded that the application did not deliver the best value for the taxpayer dollars spent. That deserves some reflection.

The federal government is now entering into another debate involving sophisticated information technology and procurement, yet in the case of ArriveCAN, or arrive scam depending on who we talk to, the Auditor General of Canada could not even establish the precise cost of the government's own application because the records were inadequate. That is not an ideological argument, but the Auditor General's finding.

Then we come to PrescribeIT. This example is arguably even more relevant because it was a health information technology project. The objective was straightforward. It is 2026; why are we still sending prescriptions around by fax? The goal of PrescribeIT was to move prescriptions electronically from prescribers to pharmacies. According to public reporting, more than $250 million was spent on PrescribeIT since 2017, yet fewer than 5% of Canadian prescriptions were being transmitted through the system. The centrally operated service ended this year after Canada Health Infoway concluded that national adoption had not been reached to the scale necessary for long-term sustainability. The organization has moved toward an open national e-prescribing standard instead. Let us think about that for a moment. The problem was not that no one could figure out how to make an electronic prescription. They could. The difficult part was getting a complicated health care system to use it. Adoption mattered. Existing information systems mattered. Costs, I would hope, mattered. Provincial participation absolutely mattered. The day-to-day practices of doctors and pharmacists mattered. Implementation mattered. ArriveCAN could teach us something about federal procurement. PrescribeIT should teach us something about health care technology implementation. Both should give the Liberal government a warning to show a little humility.

I am not saying the federal government has no role here. It does. Preventing genuine data blocking can be a legitimate federal role. Working with provinces on common technical standards makes sense. Removing legitimate federal barriers makes sense. The federal government can certainly demand results when it is spending taxpayer money. However, the Liberals on the government benches should be very careful about assuming that because they can pass a law about interoperability, they therefore know how to procure, integrate and operate health information systems better than the people delivering the care. Writing requirements in Ottawa is considerably easier than making technology work on the ground, and Canadians have paid enough money over the years to understand the difference.

I have been thinking of all of this because of two conversations I had on my Finding Solutions podcast. One was with Dr. Stuart Edmonds of the Canadian Cancer Society. We were talking about clinical trials and why they matter to cancer patients. I think most Canadians understand generally what a clinical trial is, but it looks rather different when we think about it from the perspective of somebody who has cancer and may be running out of treatment options. There may be a clinical trial available for that person, but somebody has to know that patient exists. They have to know what kind of cancer that person has. They have to know what treatments have already been tried. They may need pathology results, diagnostic information or other testing. Then they have to determine whether that patient might qualify for the trial. At that point, interoperability stops being a debate about software and becomes a question of whether the right information can get to the right people when it matters. With cancer, I do not think I have to tell members, time matters.

I had another conversation on finding solutions with Louise Binder, a long-time patient advocate working with the Save Your Skin Foundation. We talked about the postal code lottery in cancer care. We talked about clinical trials, access to new medicines, families travelling to receive treatment and what that all means for someone who is already dealing with a serious illness. We discussed this legislation on interoperable health information and the importance of a care team being able to see the full picture of the patient. That, to me, is the most persuasive case for what the government is trying to accomplish.

A cancer patient should not have to become the human interface between computer systems that cannot communicate. If someone from my communities in the Okanagan has to go to Vancouver for specialized treatment, that person should not have to reconstruct their medical history every time they encounter another part of the health care system. If someone has to travel to another province for care, that gets even harder. The relevant health information should not simply disappear because people cross the provincial boundary. The technology should work for the patient. The patient should not have to work for the technology to work.

I want to come back to the patient, because this law should exist for them. If I am a cancer patient, I do not care which company developed the software used in my hospital. I do not care what government bought the system. I want to know whether my doctor has the information he needs to treat me. That is all. If I need to go to another region or another province to obtain care, I want important information to follow me.

I therefore support interoperability. That said, passing an interoperability act and creating a truly interoperable health care system are two different things.

The government itself says that only 29% of health care providers share electronic information securely and seamlessly outside their offices. Obviously, that is not good enough, but that statistic also raises an uncomfortable question. We have been talking about digital health in Canada for years. We have spent money, billions of dollars. We have developed strategies. We have established organizations. We have announced initiatives. We have negotiated funding agreements. Where are the results?

This is not an argument against doing more. It is an argument for understanding why what we have already done has not produced the results Canadians reasonably expected. It comes down to this old political trap. There is a problem, something must be done and this is something. Therefore, we must do this. That does not mean Bill S-5 is inherently bad legislation. It means Parliament should not confuse legislative activity with health care results. Passing a bill is relatively easy. Writing regulations can be done. Holding a press conference can certainly be done. We know because we see it almost every day with the government.

However, the difficult work comes after that. How does this work with the systems provinces already purchased? What happens to older systems? How much will it cost to make them compatible? What happens when standards change? What happens when one institution is capable of exchanging the information, but another is not? What happens when the barrier is not the vendor? What happens when the problem is an existing contract, an institutional practice, a procurement decision made 10 years ago or simply an old system that is too expensive to replace? Those are not reasons to abandon interoperability. They are reasons to be honest about what this legislation can and cannot accomplish.

The federal government has a role to play, but having a role to play does not mean playing all the roles. The provinces administer their health care systems. They know their facilities. They make their own procurement decisions. They are responsible for delivering care. Ottawa can remove certain obstacles. The federal government can work with the provinces to establish common standards. It can prevent unwarranted data blocking. When it spends taxpayers' money, it can certainly demand results. However, a national standard cannot replace co-operation. Federal legislation alone cannot solve all the problems that exist in our health care systems.

There is another contrast that I think is worth considering. The federal government already knows how to sit down with provinces and reach agreements on specific health outcomes. The federal government has agreements with British Columbia, Manitoba, Prince Edward Island and the Yukon, covering a range of diabetes medications and contraception. Those are agreements with provinces and territories, yet there are only four. It seems to me that the government is pivoting away from the kind of approach that costs money and instead trying to find another problem to solve.

Interoperability, as I said, is a problem, but is that the best use of everyone's time? We need to start asking whether or not the Liberal government is seeking results or if it is just seeking to have announcements. I think the same approach should guide interoperability. What do I actually want to know about this bill?

First, would it stop vendors from blocking information that would legitimately be available? If it does, good.

Second, would these standards actually work with systems that provinces and health care providers already have? Telling everyone that tomorrow's technology must comply does not necessarily fix the equipment and the software that were purchased five or 10 years ago.

Third, how would the government work with provinces, not consult them so that someone can put a check mark beside consultation, but actually work with them?

Finally, what would the patient notice? Can they access their information? Can their doctor get the information they need? If I live in the Okanagan and go to Vancouver for treatment, can the professionals treating me see the relevant records? If I end up in an emergency room somewhere else in the country, what happens then? If I have cancer and possibly qualify for a clinical trial, will the information needed to identify that opportunity actually be available? Those are the questions I care about.

Frankly, I am less interested in whether a technology vendor can tell the federal government that it has complied with the regulation. I just want to know whether the thing actually works. Do not come back to Parliament in two years and tell us how many meetings were held. Do not tell us how many vendors submitted compliance paperwork. Do not tell us how many pages of regulations were published. Tell us what happened to the patient.

That is how we should measure success. Can patients access that information? Can doctors? If a patient moves away, can their information follow them? If a treatment or clinical trial is available, can the necessary information be accessed in a timely fashion?

Results are what matters. I do not just want to know if software is interoperable on paper. I want to know if the system works in real life.

I would just mention an incident that I had an occasion to ask a former minister of health about. In 2022, the prime minister at the time, the premier of my province, John Horgan, and the health minister, who is still a member today, reached an agreement on health care information sharing. Billions of dollars were announced. Now, that was four years ago and what has changed? Zip.

What I am saying to the government here is that it can make announcements and spend money, but that does not necessarily mean the job gets done. It should start to listen to the people who know the systems, start to put them in charge of the job and make sure that it is seen not only as an announceable, but a deliverable, and make sure the government is behind that.

After speaking with people such as Dr. Stuart Edmonds and Louise Binder, I see a case for this bill in health care very clearly, but we have learned enough from previous digital health projects and, frankly, from federal IT procurement more generally, to know that passing legislation is the easy part. Making it work is the hard part.

Let us make sure that doctors are not relying on faxes. Let us make sure that the government relies on facts. Let us not confuse passing the law with solving the problem.

Patients do not need another announcement about interoperability; they need a system that works. When a physician has to make an important decision, they should have access to the right information at the right time. Patients should not have to act as a go-between for two computer systems that cannot communicate with one another. That is the outcome we should be working toward.

Ultimately, this is not about databases. This is about people. I ask the government to really focus on the people more than the data and not to focus on the announcements, but on the actual results.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I genuinely believe that Bill S-5, and what the Minister of Health talked about when she introduced the legislation, is all about the patients. It is all about delivering for patients. It recognizes that health information technology has to play a critical role.

I agree with the member that there has to be a high sense of co-operation. Passing the legislation would not necessarily make it happen on its own. We would need to have the provinces and territories buy in. We have seen that some provinces are further ahead than others.

Would the member not agree that no matter what level of government we talk about, if everyone agrees to the principle of putting the patient first, we should be able to have a better system that would serve those patients?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I talked a little about the agreement that John Horgan, Justin Trudeau and the former minister concluded. It was for over $26 billion, over a 10-year period, to solve the very basic problem of not being able to access health records in another province. I asked the former minister what was still blocking that. It is not for a lack of money or a lack of consensus. It is implementation.

The member can say, “We're all about interoperability. We're all about data privacy and sharing of information.” That is great. I can say bravo. Good on them. However, if it does not happen, if that minister is pulling a lever that goes nowhere, it is all talk. That is a point that the Liberal government could probably learn from.

[Harb Gill, Conservative, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, before I ask my question, I want to wish my good friend Dr. Sandeep Sharma, one of the top plastic surgeons in India and past president of the Indian Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons, a happy birthday in advance.

We have seen this movie before. PrescribeIT was supposed to modernize prescription management, but the service ultimately had to shut down. The Minister of Health has consistently and steadfastly avoided questions on PrescribeIT.

Would my colleague agree that before the government embarks on another ambitious digital health initiative, Canadians deserve to know what went wrong, what the cost of that boondoggle was and why the legislation would work this time around?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate the member and his intervention. I think it comes down to one thing. It is really easy to pass legislation that forces other entities, in this case companies, usually very large organizations, to comply with particular standards. Again, whether they actually do it or not, they can send in the paperwork required and say they meet all of the requirements under the interoperability provisions of Bill S-5. That is there.

However, it is different when the rule-maker now has to be the person to deliver. That seems to be where the Liberal government continues to slide. It is like a vacuum that money, good intentions, announcements, meetings, everything gets thrown into, but nothing ever seems to come out. That is what I think Conservatives are opposed to.

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

I want to thank my colleague for his speech, which I listened to with great interest.

I would like to commend my colleague, who spoke in both official languages.

I want to talk a little about data blocking and ask the member opposite whether he believes the banning of data blocking is a good thing. We have seen some very serious instances, in his province and in mine, of companies refusing to let the data be used and refusing to let it exit the electronic systems because they are hanging onto it to monetize it. I wonder if the member thinks it is a good thing that the Government of Canada would put an end to that with Bill S-5.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, if monetizing Canadians' information was important to the government, it would be doing it right across the board.

When I walk, Apple owns my health data. When I spend, my bank owns that particular data. That is the problem here, that the government only tries to pick and choose when it believes there is something politically popular. As I said, in the case of this particular bill, it seems the government wants to do something on health care, so it has landed on something that is germane and, I think, everyone agrees with. Another member of Parliament brought up the issue of interoperability in the agricultural sector.

I think what we need to do more than anything is what the Australians considered, which is the equivalent of a royal commission, where they did intense hearings. I have read through some of their books. They are so far ahead when it comes to the issues of data, monetization, personal privacy and the efficiencies that can be given when consumers are empowered with their own information. There is so much that can be done. I hope the member pushes the government to do more on those things.

[Harb Gill, Conservative, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if this bill is about putting patients first, why does the government not establish clear consequences and penalties when health care technology companies fail to protect or properly share Canadians' medical information?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a tough but fair question, and one for which I must show respect to the member. I affectionately call him the sheriff because of his previous career in law enforcement, during which he served his community ably.

I would simply say that we can have a rule, but if we do not have consequences, then people are not going to respect the law. The sheriff is absolutely right. There needs to be more. This is why we should get it to committee, and it is why that member, I hope, will be pushing for those penalties to be clarified.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I wanted to pick up on one of the member's comments on the whole idea of technology, because I really do agree with it. We have to ensure that technology works for people and not the reverse, in terms of having access. I will get the opportunity to expand upon that shortly, but I wanted to amplify just how important it is, in recognizing Bill S-5, that the primary focus is on patients in using technology.

The member seems to imply that he supports the legislation in principle and wants to see it go to committee. Does he believe it is something that could be passed before Christmas?

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would encourage the member to speak to the hon. Minister of Transport, who in addition to being a part-time minister of that portfolio is also the government House leader. He would probably have a better read on where things are going.

All joking aside, I did not get to address this in my speech, but if we look at Europe, if we look at the United States, that is where most of these companies come from, and really, that is where the big money is spent. I do not know whether Canada would see significant compliance from those companies. I certainly hope those companies would look to do this. I just hope, though, it would not slow the adoption of new technologies as they come out, because, again, differing standards in different regions create a de facto trade barrier whether the government wants to admit it or not. I am hopeful that this bill would be helpful, but let us just say it is not unconditionally positive in all respects.

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time today with the member for Winnipeg North.

When I was a health system and academic leader, we used to talk about having two jobs in health care. First was taking care of the patient of today. To do that work, obviously, we need access to the health data across a patient's journey, no matter where they are in the health care system. We also talked about having a second patient, the patient of tomorrow, and that is the work of supporting research, quality improvement and health system innovation.

Bill S-5 is a critical piece of legislation that would allow us to care for both the patient of today and the patient of tomorrow, and that is why I am proud to rise in the House today to speak in support of it.

All over Canada today, people are going to visit their family doctors. They are going to be talking about their mental health. They are going to be talking about their diabetes and their blood pressure control. They are going to be talking about their cancer journeys. They are going to be getting immunizations, prescriptions and requisitions for medical imaging. They might be getting a referral to a specialist. They might be referred for counselling or for physiotherapy. In pretty much every one of those family doctor's offices today, they are going to find their family doctor sitting and typing away on a computer, generating tasks for the physician or the health care worker and for the patient.

If a referral is made, the doctor is going to be typing away, generating forms inside that computer, and if that patient then goes to see a specialist, they are going to find the specialist sitting at their desk taking notes on a computer. If they end up in an emergency situation and have to go to the hospital, all the notes, the test results and the imaging results are going to be stored in an electronic record.

In my community of downtown Toronto, those places, the family doctor's office, the hospital, the emergency department and the specialist's office, might be just a few subway stops away from each other. Sometimes they are even in the same building, so one could forgive a patient for assuming those computers are talking to each other. However, it turns out that all too often, that is not the case. People could be forgiven for asking why, in a set of single-payer health systems across the country in any given province or territory, the data generated in the hospital, the data generated in the doctor's office and the data generated in the home care interface are sitting in separate silos, not talking to each other.

Bill S-5 seeks to remedy that. By requiring the vendors of the electronic systems we use in our health systems every day to meet interoperability standards and putting an end to data blocking, wherein vendors hold onto the data of Canadians under the mistaken view that they own the data about the health of our people, as opposed to the patient and the health system as a public good, we would be putting in place the necessary infrastructure for a modern health care system across the country.

It used to be that in order for electronic systems to talk to each other in a health care system, they had to actually be on the same system. I am pleased that this is no longer the case. We do not need all of Canada to be using a single electronic health record for data to flow in the ways that patients need, because technology has leapfrogged that requirement. When vendors meet those interoperability standards referred to in this bill, the data would be able to move in order for us to take better care of people. The hospital and the clinic would be able to securely share information that is relevant to the care of the patient.

To emphasize the importance of this bill, one need only quote the preamble:

the health information of Canadians is not easily accessible to them or to their health care professionals, which puts the safety of Canadians at risk;

There is broad consensus among stakeholders that the interoperability between health technologies and health information systems, as well as a prohibition of data blocking, are necessary to ensure patient health and safety, improve health outcomes and promote equitable care for Canadians.

For patients to make informed decisions about their own health, they must have easy, comprehensive and secure access to their health information. Their health care professionals and researchers must also have access to it.

Why does this bill matter? Why do we need health records to be interoperable, and why do we need health data to be treated as a public good?

I want to speak to primary use and secondary use and begin by talking about the delivery of clinical care and access to one's own records. We have covered well in the House today in this debate the necessity of interoperability of health records for patient safety in terms of clinicians being able to access critical information when a person comes in for care, so I want to focus my remarks on the two other critical aspects. First is the ability of Canadians to access their own health records. Second is the ability to use the data for research, quality improvement and system oversight.

The pan-Canadian OurCare consultations, led by Dr. Tara Kiran and an incredible national team of researchers and experts in public engagement and primary care, had conversations with hundreds of people living across Canada to understand what Canadians wanted from a better primary care system. In their conversations, a core refrain arose again and again: People in Canada are frustrated that they do not have access to their own medical information. People shared how not having access to their own medical records made it challenging to get the care they need when they had an emergency, when they moved to a different province, when their doctor moved or retired, when they did not have a doctor or when they were just trying to advocate for themselves or for their loved ones.

Through the OurCare consultations, people in Canada spoke clearly and consistently. They want access to their own health records online in a format they can share with clinicians and loved ones and where they can have confidence that the information will be kept private and secure, which is not a very radical or unusual idea. Countries around the world have already given people access to their own health records through an app, like the Nordic countries, for example, but also Estonia, Spain, Portugal, France, England and Australia, just to name a few.

As we look to build national infrastructure and to become more self-reliant as a country and as we look to create the conditions for our country to thrive in the years to come, we need to invest in the most foundational of assets: the health of our people. Bill S-5 would open the door for people being able to access their own health records by ensuring that their data would be liberated from the vendors who may be holding on to it.

That brings me to secondary use and the patient of tomorrow. This is an aspect of data interoperability we should not neglect, because beyond the care of individual people, we need health data to do quality improvement, to do groundbreaking research, to engage in health system oversight and to develop artificial intelligence and apply it to the biggest problems facing the health of Canadians.

This is what we call secondary use of data, because health data is the raw material for improving care. Research and quality improvement teams use data to track people's health outcomes over time, to measure the impact of our interventions and to ask important questions that will lead to the next generation of breakthroughs.

Health data also contains the stories of important inequities and outcomes across the country. It helps us to understand whether people living in rural communities, people experiencing homelessness, indigenous people, Black Canadians and other groups are getting the care they deserve. This information can then drive our investments and programs as a government, but to understand the story, we need the data. Our superb Canadian researchers and health system leaders cannot do their jobs without it, and if it is being blocked sitting inside a vendor's records, we are going to be in trouble.

Finally, I want to say a few words about artificial intelligence. We are obviously at a new frontier. If we want to use AI to reduce wait times in emergency departments or wait times for specialist care, and if we want to use AI to improve the quality of care being provided to seniors in long-term care, to cancer patients in our cancer centres or to children in our family doctors' offices, we are going to need data and the data will need to be linked in order for us to do it.

Bill S-5 would regulate vendors. It would require them to play ball in ensuring that data can be shared across our health systems. Once the data is unblocked and interoperable, a lot of work still remains to be done. This bill would not replace the work ahead on sovereignty, commercialization, data export approaches and indigenous data sovereignty, all of which have been flagged by our colleagues in the Senate, but it would lay the foundation for all those things. Bill S-5 would lay the foundation for us to care for the patient of today and tomorrow. I am proud to support it.

[Harb Gill, Conservative, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I can sense the passion in my colleague's voice. I want to thank her for her over two decades' worth of service as a family physician.

She knows first-hand where the system breaks down. If she could fix one particular thing in this bill, what would it be and how would it help regular Canadians?

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in my colleague's riding today, as in mine, there are family physicians like my colleagues who are spending an inordinate amount of time chasing results, trying to figure out what happened to their patient when they were admitted to the hospital and what changes were made to their medications, and calling the pharmacy to try to figure out what occurred. This bill would lay a foundation. It would open the door for the kind of information data flow that is truly necessary to fix these problems. A lot of work would have to happen after that. The bill would not magically fix everything, but if we do not pass it, we will not have the infrastructure necessary to address these important issues.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her service for two decades. She knows exactly about one patient, one data.

Can my colleague tell us how the bill would reduce barriers to care? Also, we heard that there is workforce pressure. How would it be more helpful for the patient and reduce the burden of administrative work?

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think we all know that the barriers for health care workers in the system today are considerable. There is a lot that artificial intelligence, for example, can do to improve the productivity of our health systems and reduce administrative burdens on our health care providers, whether they are a home care worker in a home, a PSW in long-term care or a nurse practitioner in primary care. AI can help all those people spend their time taking care of patients instead of running around trying to access information. It can reduce the administrative burden, whether it is from filling out forms or getting appointments for patients. However, all of that requires that the data be accessible, that it be linked and interoperable and that it not be blocked by the vendors of electronic medical records and electronic health records. That is why this bill would make a difference for the workers in our health systems across Canada.

[Kelly DeRidder, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I agree wholeheartedly that data transfer between departments and interchangeability are extremely important to help reduce harm in Canada. One thing the member mentioned in her speech is that the bill would lay the foundation for data transferability within Canada, but it would not complete the conversation on data sovereignty. How can we lay the foundation for data transfer but not at the same time lay the foundation for data sovereignty? If we are not doing that, are we not be putting health data in Canada at risk?

[Danielle Martin, Liberal, University—Rosedale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it will be critical, in order to do this work, for the data to flow. The data needs to be linked so that across different parts of the health care system, we can follow a patient's journey over time. Once that occurs at the technical level, we have to figure out how we will govern the data, how we will make sure that privacy is protected and how we will ensure that the data is available to the people who need to use it and have permission to use it, but not misused by others, whether that would happen through the regulations coming out of this bill or, more likely, at the level of the health systems as people work through this over time. Right now, people across Canada doing health care leadership cannot even begin those conversations because they cannot access the data because it is being blocked. This is a necessary step on the journey to health system transformation across Canada.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and speak to Bill S-5 today. If we take a look at information nowadays, it has never been easier to access. It has become critically important that when we take a look at our health care system, we look at ways in which we can improve upon it.

I want to reflect on some of the days, going as far back as when I was the health care critic in the province of Manitoba, when I was meeting with patients and stakeholders. Even back then, they were talking about information gathered on behalf of clients or patients and how that information is retained and ultimately shared.

I remember that when I had to change my family doctor, as my first one made the decision to retire, I was given a yellow envelope to bring to my new doctor. A year ago or so, when I was with my family doctor inside the checkup room, he was sitting at a computer, which I could watch. It was truly amazing how he was able to connect my health care needs through the computer. I did not have to get a prescription issued from the doctor or a piece of paper. Rather, he told me that I could go to X place and that my prescription would be ready.

When I take a look at what Bill S-5 is all about, it is all about patients, whether directly or indirectly. That is why I would like to think that all members of the House will see the value of supporting the legislation.

I have listened to members opposite all morning talk about the concerns they have, and I am not going to marginalize their concerns. I suspect that all members have some concerns as we move into this area. It is a very challenging area; there is no doubt about it. Someone mentioned that while we could bring in legislation, it would not guarantee that the system is going to work and the patient is going to benefit. There are jurisdictional issues. To individuals who are genuinely concerned about the issue of which level of government is responsible for what, I will say that instead of that being the primary concern, the primary concern should be the patient.

If we view this through that lens, I believe we will see more co-operation taking place among institutions, private companies, non-profit companies and the different levels of government, if we are prepared to do what the minister has made very clear. In her statement, she talked about working with provincial and territorial jurisdictions and indigenous communities.

At the end of the day, information does matter. What takes place in our doctors' offices, our hospitals, our care facilities and our pharmacies really does matter, as does a person's ability to go into a facility, whatever type of facility it might be, and have a sense that a health care provider has access to the information that is so very important for that patient. If that were to be done right, where we get collaboration and get all systems onside moving in one direction, with the priority being the patient, we would see less duplication.

People would understand the differences in medications that might be being taken at one end versus at the other end. Some testing may not have to take place, or in some cases testing would take place, such as an x-ray, a lab test or whatever it might be. The different types of medications an individual takes throughout the year would be known. These are all important pieces of information. In working collaboratively with other jurisdictions, I would argue, as I said at the outset, and putting the lens on the patient, it is the patient who would benefit with the passage of Bill S-5.

I had the opportunity to ask members opposite some questions regarding the principle of the legislation. I am encouraged by the Minister of Health and the government's agenda to get this legislation through with fantastic support from the Senate of Canada. I am pleased with the general approach of the opposition, as the principle of the legislation appears to have been accepted. That being said, I suspect there might be a number of issues, based on what I have heard, that would come up at the committee stage.

I am sure there would be representation at the committee stage about issues related to things such as data blocking, which has been talked about a great deal. Data blocking is done far too often. Because of a vested interest, information is being retained by one vendor for reasons I will not go into today, but much of it would be driven by the dollar. Data blocking would be directly dealt with in this legislation, which is a very good thing.

Then there are interoperable issues. For example, in the province of Manitoba, there might be a care facility using a different technology system from what is being used at the Health Sciences Centre. Because of that, it is the patient who loses the most. That is one of the reasons the compatibility of technologies is so important in the legislation. The data would be able to be transferred. We hear a great deal about data, records and so forth, and it is important for us to recognize that with regard to data and technology, the government is very concerned with ensuring that privacy is respected. As we know, Canadians are very concerned about the issue of privacy, and understandably so.

Some provinces are further advanced than others, and I recognize that, but as we roll this out, what would end up happening is that the quality of health care services would improve for all Canadians. The health care worker, be it a nurse or a doctor, would have better opportunity to provide bedside care or to provide consultation, as a direct result of moving forward with Bill S-5. That is not to mention, as some have already pointed out, that it would also save lives.

Someone asked why it is taking us as long as it is. I think it is important to recognize that we have a very substantial legislative agenda. In the last 18 months, we have been pushing forward on a series of legislative initiatives. This bill is an important piece to it, because our health care matters in Canada. Canadians want us—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Kitchener Centre.

[Kelly DeRidder, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one thing in particular the member opposite said that I would like to concentrate on is that we have to look at this through the lens of the patient. I wholeheartedly agree with that, and the lens I am going to look through is data security. If this is implemented across Canada in partnership of course with the provinces, how would we ensure that, first, it would still be the patient who would decide whether the data is going to be transferred, and, second, how would that data be protected?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member, in posing the questions, highlighted something I had indicated. If everyone would do exactly what she did with respect to her question, which is to put the patient first and look at it through that lens, I suspect that the debate would be well served not only on the floor of the House of Commons but also in committee. I can assure the member that it does not matter what side of the House one looks at. I believe every member wants to ensure the privacy and protection of data. There is no doubt whatsoever in my mind on that.