Mr. Speaker, fraudulent and rejected asylum claims are straining a health care system that millions of Canadians cannot fully access. The interim federal health program's costs have more than quadrupled in four years, from $211 million to $896 million, and they are projected to reach $1.5 billion by 2029.
At committee, we learned that providers are billing taxpayers up to five times the provincial rate for services to rejected claimants. Meanwhile, some six million Canadians lack a family doctor, yet failed claimants have supplementary benefits including vision care, benefits that many Canadians must pay for out of pocket. This is neither fair nor sustainable.
Conservatives are calling for limiting benefits for rejected claimants to emergency and life-saving care only. We are calling for full annual transparency to Parliament and the immediate removal of foreign nationals convicted of serious crimes. Canada is a compassionate country, but it must first be fair to its own citizens.