Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today to speak to the opposition motion of the Bloc Quebecois. I would like to remind you that it reads as follows:
That the House endorses the provincial consensus reached in Saskatoon on August 7, 1998, that the federal government must restore, via the existing provisions of the Canada health and social transfer (CHST), its contributions to front-line health care services, starting with a payment of at least $2 billion, given that the federal government has already recorded an accumulated surplus of $10,4 billion for the first six months of the 1998-99 fiscal year.
That is $10.4 billion just for the first six months of the 1998-99 fiscal year. Where does this money come from? How did the government manage not only to eliminate its deficit but also to register a budgetary surplus?
The government achieved this surplus by misappropriating employment insurance funds, at the expense of the unemployed. It did this by cutting the Canada social transfer, which is the budget for health, education and welfare, and by going after the sick and the disadvantaged.
Since it came to office, the federal government has drastically slashed transfer payments to the provinces. In 1994, these payments amounted to $18.8 billion, compared to $12.5 billion in 1997-98, a decrease of $6.3 billion.
For example, in 1994, social transfers averaged $678 per capita. In 1998, this average has dropped to $386, the lowest in 20 years.
The provinces are faced with very serious problems in the health area, as the cost of health care keeps rising because of the ageing population and because of increasingly expensive drugs and new technologies. The impact of the cuts in health care are being felt not only in Quebec but across Canada.
Here are some examples. We are told that the people of Manitoba are going to Dakota to get medical attention. In Newfoundland, army doctors have been called upon to help relieve the pressure in emergency wards. We recently learned about the difficult situation facing hospital administrators in Ontario. Health ministers throughout Canada are telling us that they are feeling the impact of all these cuts.
Last August, in Saskatoon, the premiers reached a consensus and agreed to urge the federal government to pay back the $6.3 billion a year in transfer payments, now that the federal government has a surplus. All of them want the federal government to restore funding to the 1993-94 level of $18.8 billion.
They also asked the federal government to respect their jurisdiction. We hear that the federal government intends to reinvest in health care in the next budget, but it wants to do so without respecting provincial jurisdiction.
We are told about some kind of national infrastructure including a drug plan, home care and all kinds of other programs. The provinces will be told: “Here, we are giving you this money for these programs, but you have to abide by our standards. You are not going to be able to run your own show. We are offering you this money to put in place the programs we think you need”. Yet, the Constitution clearly states that health care is an area of provincial jurisdiction.
This is the reason why last August in Saskatoon the premiers asked the federal government, instead of creating new programs, to restore transfer payments to the level they were at when the government was elected. If the federal government insists on setting up such programs, the provinces should have the option to accept or reject them—this is what we call the right to opt out with compensation. If a province decides to opt out because, as is the case in Quebec, it already has such programs, it should be fully compensated.
I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, but I forgot to mention that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Quebec.
I would now like to speak about the impact the cuts have had in Quebec: cuts to health care in Quebec amount to at least $1 billion a year.
Looking at the $6.3 billion in cuts to the Canada health and social transfer, Quebec alone has been hit by close to 30% of the federal cuts, which represents close to $2 billion yearly. It is estimated that 50% of the federal transfer of $2 billion, or $1 billion, goes to health.
When health care reform was being carried out in Quebec, a reform that was not absolutely necessary, but we were lagging behind the other provinces, imagine if we had been able to benefit from an additional $1 billion per year for health in Quebec. That would have meant more money for home care, more money for day surgery, more money for long term care, more for pharmacare, more for in-patient care.
The Quebec government had to react rapidly, as I have already said, because we already lagged behind the other provinces.
I think the Government of Quebec has succeeded where others failed, or dared not even try. In Quebec we succeeded, despite all the difficulties that can go along with such a reform. We succeeded while undergoing cuts in the Canada social transfer.
Had an extra $1 billion a year been available to the Quebec government for this reform, the Mauricie and central Quebec region, in which my riding is located and which receives approximately 6.2% of the total health budget, would have received $62 billion to be reinvested in my region.
The Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean region could have used another $38 million from the $1 billion claim against the federal government. Comparing this with the $34.4 million the Jonquière hospital receives, we realize we could use this money. This amount is almost equivalent to the entire budget of the hospital.
I therefore close by saying that the Liberals used the billions of dollars stolen from Quebeckers and Canadians to eliminate the deficit. Now it has to give us back the money we are owed.
