Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister has money for health, why does he not heed the request by the Fédération des femmes du Québec to restore transfer payments to the provinces?
House of Commons photoWon her last election, in 2006, with 50% of the vote.
Health March 9th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister has money for health, why does he not heed the request by the Fédération des femmes du Québec to restore transfer payments to the provinces?
Health March 9th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.
According to a persistent rumour, the Minister of Health is planning to establish a new $1 billion national home care program.
Does the Prime Minister agree that this new program is first and foremost designed to ensure the visibility of the federal government, as suggested by a Health Canada official this morning?
The Budget March 9th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, I can understand the secretary of state defending the budget. What I do not understand and what I reject is the extent of his lack of knowledge of the Quebec system of loans and grants.
The millennium fund simply duplicates things. He cannot deny that. If he understands the Quebec system, if he has examined it or if he is interested in it he will see that this fund duplicates what already exists. Why not give this $80 million to the provinces in compensation and to help them improve a system they all approve?
All the provincial ministers of finance and education acknowledge that in Quebec we have the best system of student loans and grants. I do not know where he gets the idea that students do not agree with us and are in favour of the millennium fund, because it is not true.
He only need contact the various representatives of certain federations, such as the Fédération des universités et des cégeps and the Fédération des étudiants du postsecondaire to discover their total disagreement.
Currently, students receive an average of $3,800 annually in grants open to all students, according to need. The millennium fund promises $3,000 on the basis of need and merit, to be determined by a board of directors. This is a waste. Where is the system that will really ensure justice or determine a student's merit?
Do you think a student in debt, who is poor and has to work part time to pay for his studies, is going to do as well as a student whose parents are well off and can look after his needs? This is where the unfairness lies.
Regardless, what is being proposed at the moment is the duplication, in Quebec, of one of the best systems, a system praised across Canada. So why not give Quebec the right to opt out with compensation so it can help more students who are in debt?
I suggest the government go back to the drawing board on this and, if it is really so open, allow Quebec to opt out of the millennium fund.
The Budget March 9th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague from Saint-Eustache—Sainte-Thérèse for sharing her time with me.
I too am pleased to take part in the discussion on this universally criticized budget. Even if we agree with the results, we can have some very serious reservations on the means used to accomplish them, because we know that this zero deficit plus surpluses has been reached at the expense of the provinces, middle-income families, the unemployed, the sick, students and welfare recipients.
But where does this surplus come from? In 1993, the Liberal red book said it was unrealistic to wish to eliminate the federal deficit in five years. The Prime Minister stated that such an objective could not be attained without pillaging social programs, and no Liberal government would agree to do such a thing. Four budgets later, the federal deficit is now eliminated, but at the price they refused to pay in 1993.
The main accomplishment of the Liberal government as far as beating the deficit is concerned can be summarized as follows: $42 billion in cuts to hospitals, universities and welfare, an employment insurance reform which impoverishes the unemployed, coupled with an economic upturn combined with non-indexed tax tables. That is what the zero deficit is all about.
But, let us face it, this approach of getting other people to do what one is incapable of doing oneself has put the federal government in a position where, for the first time in a long while, there was the possibility of somewhat lightening the tax burden of Canadian and Quebec taxpayers, the working and the unemployed, in short those who are responsible for the situation we are now in.
Fifty-four per cent, or more than half, of the cuts in expenditures made by the federal government between 1994 and 1998, moreover, were dumped onto the governments of Quebec and the provinces, to the tune of $6.3 billion annually. An annual amount of $6.3 billion is no trifle.
Yet in 1993, the Prime Minister stated “In our program, we have no intention of cutting payments to individuals or to the provinces. That is clear and it is in writing”. I refer those who may want to know where this quote is from to the September 25, 1993 edition of La Presse . Of course, no one believed at the time that this promise would be kept any more than the others, the GST for example.
However, the current fiscal situation, which was achieved thanks to the efforts of provincial governments, permitted at the very least that the provinces be compensated for the losses caused by this offloading. To this end, the government could have given them as tax points 25% of the next two years' surpluses, thereby cancelling out the cuts imposed during the first Liberal mandate in the transfers for health, education and social assistance.
This would have enabled the provincial governments to regain the flexibility lost in previous budgets while not affecting the federal government's finances. Indeed, it would still record a surplus of approximately $30.8 billion in 2001-02, even if 25% of the next two years' surpluses were paid back to the provinces.
There they go creating new programs. It has been known for months that the finance minister's latest budget would be a surplus budget, or at least a balanced budget. All the stakeholders, be it the Bloc Quebecois or the other opposition parties, the premiers and finance ministers of Quebec or the provinces, asked, begged the Liberal government not to start spending again before having made up for the losses resulting from the cuts made these past few years in health, education and social programs.
Nothing was done. The government has gone right back to wasting taxpayers' money, introducing a myriad of new measures that will duplicate or overlap what is already being done in the provinces, and running the risk of again losing control of its spending and plunging us into a deficit spiral.
The best example of this renewed interference is the creation of millennium scholarships. This fund is a pointless affront to the governments of Quebec and of the other provinces and makes no provision for withdrawal with compensation. The Prime Minister is bent on sending out cheques with the maple leaf on them and was certainly not going to be stopped by considerations of jurisdiction, as defined in his own Constitution.
This morning, in an article about a new home care program, a health department official told us why the federal government was introducing this new program: “We want to see the maple leaf on the cheque”. As one of my constituents said to me, if the Prime Minister is so interested in visibility, all he has to do is put his picture on the twenty-dollar bill.
Quebec already has a student assistance program that is a vast improvement on all similar programs in Canadian provinces. Not only is it the only program with loans that are advantageous for students, but it is the only one where they do not have to pay back scholarships when they graduate. The result is that the average indebtedness of Quebec students is half that of students in other provinces.
No one in Quebec wants to see that money wasted on some program that would duplicate what is already being done and done well. Even the education sector condemns this “operation visibility” which, in the end, will be conducted at the expense of the students themselves. Hopefully, the appeals to common sense made by Quebec stakeholders will be heard by the Prime Minister, before the upcoming meeting with Quebec government officials.
I also want to talk about health, since I am the critic on this issue. In Quebec, and everywhere in Canada, health is probably the sector where the federal government has done the most damage. Disconnected as it is from the medical realities in the provinces, the federal government offloaded its deficit onto provincial health programs, at a time when the provinces themselves were in the middle of a restructuring process. After blaming the provinces for its cuts, the federal government should have redistributed the surplus of the last budget to alleviate the negative impact that it helped create in the first place.
Yet, the new budget does confirm that federal cuts totalling $42 billion will be made between now and the year 2002. However, it is silent on how the government will use the additional $70 million that will be generated by the increase on tobacco taxes. The budget includes no new measures to deter young people from smoking, and it does not provide any compensation for sports and cultural events.
But the biggest disappointment is the lack of any reference to the financial compensation the victims of Hepatitis C contamination have been awaiting for years, which the government can now afford to pay immediately. Unfortunately, a measure of this type did not fit in with the Liberal's objective of keeping a high profile. Yet the federal government could implement this immediately, without waiting for the provinces, which are already saddled with the costs of services provided to these victims through the health system.
The biggest surprise where health is concerned came, not in the budget speech, but from the mouth of the Minister of Health, when he brought into the open the federal government's true intentions as far as encroachments on health are concerned. This is unacceptable.
Since you are indicating I have only a minute left, Mr. Speaker, I will move on immediately to my conclusion, which is that the latest budget by the Minister of Finance has once again confirmed what the Bloc Quebecois has been saying for a number of years, that the federal government's plan is to put the provinces in a shaky situation budget-wise, and then to come along to rescue them with new initiatives in areas that fall within provincial jurisdiction.
The best illustration of this approach is provided by the President of Treasury Board himself, with his statement that “When Bouchard has to make cuts, we in Ottawa will then be able to demonstrate that we have the means to preserve the future of social programs”. Here we have both overlap and duplication.
Hepatitis C Victims February 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, since the federal government has primary responsibility for the blood supply system, since the provinces already defray the health costs of hepatitis C victims and given the huge cuts made in transfer payments to the provinces for health, is the federal government prepared to take into account the substantial amounts already paid by the provinces for the treatment of hepatitis C victims in negotiating compensation for these people?
Health February 23rd, 1998
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Health.
Whereas the federal government is the primary supplier of blood products, whereas the provinces already pay the costs of health care for victims of Hepatitis C; and in light of the huge cuts by the federal government to provincial health transfer payments, is the federal government prepared, in negotiating the damages to be paid to victims of Hepatitis C, to take into account the large amounts the provinces are already contributing to health care for victims of Hepatitis C?
Nancy Drolet February 19th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, February 17, in Nagano, the Canadian women's hockey team won the silver medal in a hotly disputed match against the American team. A young woman from my riding was on this team: Nancy Drolet from Drummondville.
Nancy's record is impressive. She has played in 15 Canadian championships in nine years and twice at the Canada Games. At the international level, the teams she has been a member of have won five gold medals and one silver in six years. And today, Nancy has become an Olympic medalist, an honour we all share.
On behalf of my constituents, I congratulate you, Nancy. Your determination is something else. We wish you all the best in your future endeavours.
Sponsorship Of Sports And Cultural Events February 18th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, the Quebec minister of finance recently announced that $12 million in tobacco tax revenues would be used to subsidize sports and cultural events in Quebec.
In order to avoid having sports and cultural events suffer because of the fight against smoking, when will the Minister of Health finally introduce the long promised amendments?
Criminal Code February 17th, 1998
The member for Laval Centre, Mrs. Dalphond-Guiral, seconds the motion.
I am happy to take part in the debate on Bill C-247, the purpose of which is to amend the Criminal Code. We are dealing with genetic manipulation, but to be more precise, the purpose of the bill is to have the Criminal Code prohibit cloning of human beings.
I am particularly proud because I sponsored Bill C-247. I would also like to thank my colleague from Laval Centre for seconding the motion.
Before I begin, I would like to read you an editorial by Ginette Gagnon of the Nouvelliste , who said:
Less than a year ago, the world was astounded to learn that a Scottish researcher had just produced the first adult animal clone, the famous Dolly. It appeared unthinkable that such genetic engineering could be used on humans. Now an American physicist from Chicago, Dr. Richard Seed, would like to defy scientific morals and open a lab to clone humans. The doctor, described as mad, will likely succeed in carrying out his project if the international community takes no action to stop him and more specifically to prohibit this practice throughout the world.
On February 27, the science magazine, Nature , published a report in which the authors described how a team of researchers succeeded for the first time in history in producing a healthy lamb from breast tissue taken from an adult sheep. It was a first. The main point was not the birth of the lamb, known as Dolly, it was the fact that human cloning was a possibility.
I will define a clone for people. What is it? The popular definition is that it is an organism, a person, an animal or a plant that is a completely identical or nearly identical copy of another organism in terms of appearance or function. On the biological level, it refers to a population of organisms, cells or genetically identical DNA molecules resulting from the asexual reproduction of a single organism.
Shortly after the news of the cloning of Dolly, we in fact learned that scientists in Oregon had cloned two monkeys from embryonic cells, a first among primates. One way or another, regardless of the techniques used, it is very easily imaginable that, with the rapid progress of recent years, human cloning may be commonplace before the end of the century.
People's concerns about the attempts to clone humans are therefore totally justified, even if no one has as yet advanced one single acceptable reason, from the ethical point of view, for performing such a manipulation. This, then, is the context in which I introduce Bill C-247.
By so doing, I have no delusions that I am putting an end to the debate on medically assisted reproductive techniques. On the contrary, I am aware that Bill C-247 does not offer a blanket response to all questions, nor is it intended to. In fact, if there is one lesson that can be learned from the evidence heard during the committee examination of Bill C-47, which dealt with the new reproductive techniques in general, it is that not all techniques can be put in the same basket, and they cannot be regulated as one whole. Each technique has its own specific characteristics, and raises specific questions and reflections which require different types of action.
I would like to review what has gone on in Canada in connection with the new reproductive technologies. The first government inquiry into the new reproductive technologies was the 1989 Baird Commission. Its mandate was to look into current and foreseeable progress in science and medicine relating to reproductive techniques, their repercussions on health and research, their moral, social, economic and legal consequences, and their impact on the general public, and to recommend policies and protective measures to be adopted.
Four years of studies, 40,000 witnesses and $28 million later, the Baird Commission tabled its report in November 1993. The main conclusions and recommendations were broadly similar to the foreign studies on this topic, in particular the Warlock report done in 1980 by Great Britain.
The federal government was slow to follow up on the report, preferring, unlike the Baird Commission, to extend the consultations to provincial governments. The Bloc Quebecois asked many questions in the House, in order to force the government to table the bill, which would criminalize certain practices related to the new reproductive technologies.
It was not until July 1995 that the government finally took concrete action, imposing a voluntary moratorium prohibiting nine reproductive techniques, including the cloning of human embryos.
The Bloc Quebecois, and a number of editorial writers, former members of the Baird Commission, including Patricia Baird, media, and interest groups, such as women's and religious groups, have criticized the voluntary nature of the moratorium, since certain physicians and clinics are continuing to perform techniques prohibited by this moratorium.
In January 1996, the federal government announced that it was creating a temporary advisory committee, with the mandate to enforce the moratorium, follow the development of new reproductive technologies and advise the minister.
As you might imagine, this purely voluntary moratorium has not been enforced. As an example, we could mention the advertisements that appeared in the University of Toronto's Varsity , offering to buy ova from young women for infertile couples.
In addition, some establishments continue to pay sperm donors, and physicians say some patients still ask them to retrieve sperm from their deceased husbands.
On June 14, 1996, the then federal Minister of Health, David Dingwall, introduced Bill C-47, along with a statement of principles setting out the federal government's proposed overall policy on management of NRTs. Bill C-47 included the techniques prohibited under the moratorium, and added certain others. It must be made clear, however, that these techniques were not made offences under the Criminal Code, and that as a result provincial authorities would not have been responsible for enforcing the law.
The second phase the federal government hoped to accomplish was to amend Bill C-47 to include a regulatory framework on all techniques of reproduction and genetic manipulation.
A national control and monitoring agency for the new reproductive technologies would have ensured application of the legislation, issued permits, inspected clinics and enforced the regulations. As well, that body would have monitored developments in NRTs and advised the federal Minister of Health in this area.
The Bloc Quebecois, although it approved in principle of Bill C-47, was vehemently opposed to the creation of a new national agency, and objected to the fact that there was no provision being added to the Criminal Code.
During the Standing Committee on Health, witnesses voiced a number of misgivings about the content of Bill C-47; they felt that it was too restrictive, too negative, that it was hindering research and depriving infertile couples of their only remaining option for having a child.
The most common comment made by witnesses was that it is inappropriate to put assisted reproduction procedures and genetic technologies in the same legal framework. These are, they said, different fields requiring different frameworks. Despite all these disagreements, however, there was one consensus: the necessity to take the necessary steps as soon as possible to ban the cloning of human beings.
On this point in particular, everyone agrees that there is not, at this time, any good justification for allowing the cloning of human beings, whatever the procedure used.
When the federal election was called last April, Bill C-47 died on the Order Paper , just as it was about to come back to the House for third reading. There is good reason to think the government was not unhappy to see the bill expire.
In fact, numerous criticisms raised by the scientific community with respect to the content and even the spirit of several provisions of the federal bill would have forced the government to make significant changes.
One of the results of the death of Bill C-47 is that all research and experiments in Canada are still subject to the voluntary moratorium introduced by the then Minister of Health, Ms. Marleau, in July 1995. Need I mention that urgent action is required?
In its final report, the Royal Commission on New Reproductive Technologies concluded, and I quote: “We have judged that certain activities conflict so sharply with the values espoused by Canadians and by this Commission, and are so potentially harmful to the interests of individuals and of society, that they must be prohibited by the federal government under threat of criminal sanction”.
These activities include human zygote/embryo research related to ectogenesis, cloning, animal/human hybrids, the transfer of zygotes to another species, and so on.
While the members of the international community seem unanimous in their opposition to all forms of human cloning, concerns over possible attempts at human cloning are justified. No one has yet shown that this practice does not involve serious ethical problems. Scientists, including the researchers who have cloned Dolly, have indicated they have no intention of trying to clone human beings.
However, there are a number of supporters of animal cloning. According to some, it might be possible to create strains of animals able to produce in their milk great quantities of proteins that may be useful in treating human diseases. Experiments like the one producing Dolly could also help researchers better understand human reproduction and hereditary illnesses, like cancer.
A clause in Bill C-47 prohibited human cloning. It is this clause we have incorporated in Bill C-247. It criminalizes human cloning, without however prohibiting scientific research in genetics, which may be beneficial in a number of areas.
The main clause of Bill C-247 reads as follows:
286.1(1) No person shall knowingly
(a) manipulate an ovum, zygote or embryo for the purpose of producing a zygote or embryo that contains the same genetic information as a living or deceased human being or a zygote, embryo or foetus, or implant in a woman a zygote or embryo so produced; or
(b) alter the genetic structure of an ovum, human sperm, zygote or embryo if the altered structure is capable of transmission to a subsequent generation.
(2) No person shall offer to carry out any procedure prohibited by subsection (1).
(3) No person shall offer consideration to any person for carrying out any procedure prohibited by subsection (1).
Since all known and imaginable cloning techniques will still require either sperm or a human ovum, or both, banning modification to their genetic structure and their manipulation for the purpose of perpetuating genetic characteristics in other fetuses or embryos, closes the door right from the start to the process of manipulation which leads to human cloning.
Clauses 2 and 3 in the bill extend the penalties to any person offering or requesting a deliberate human cloning experiment. This also closes the door to the researchers of this world, the likes of Richard Seed, who might be tempted to offer their services in Canada, as well as to those who might be tempted to seek out their services.
On numerous occasions, the Bloc Quebecois has called on the federal government to intervene in order to forbid these practices relating to the new reproductive technologies. Numerous questions were asked in this House to spur the government into action.
We also issued two press releases in which we called for criminalization of the sale of ova, embryos and fetal tissue. In May 1994, Minister Allan Rock stated that the bill was slated for introduction that fall. The very limited voluntary moratorium followed only in the summer of 1995, while Bill C-47, which merely transform the moratorium into law, was introduced in June 1996. Now it is February 1998. Nothing has been done yet, and it is very troubling.
Finally, and at another level, it must be emphasized that the new reproductive technologies raise an extremely serious and worrisome problem for the very future of our society as we know it.
While the birth rate is plummeting, genetic medicine and the NRTs are evolving exponentially. The use of these technologies challenges our values, because it involves the very definition of the foundations of our society, our descendants.
Within the medical community itself, stakeholders do not agree on the limits that should or should not be imposed. Within the general public, there is even greater confusion because of a lack of knowledge and information.
I quote Louise Vandelac, a sociologist and specialist in this field. She wrote:
Through ignorance, indifference, naivete or defeatism, we therefore leave up to the so-called specialists something that, from the dawn of time, has ensured the survival of the species and the network of family and social relationships, procreation, filiation and their evolution, when what is at stake is nothing less than our own and humanity's transformation.
How should we react to the “dematernalization” of procreation? At what point should we call a halt to the genetic manipulation that some people would like to use to eliminate certain diseases, but that others would like to use to improve humankind?
I will conclude. I would simply like to tell you that I am deeply worried about the scientist I mentioned earlier who wants to open human cloning clinics and who said that cloning and reprogramming DNA is the first real step toward man taking his place beside God.
If that is not blasphemy, I do not know what is. I therefore ask all members in the House to give their support for Bill C-247. Our society depends on it.
Criminal Code February 17th, 1998
moved that Bill C-247, an act to amend the Criminal Code (genetic manipulation), be read the second time and referred to a committee.
Madam Speaker, I was told I could have 15 minutes to introduce this bill and that I could take five more minutes at the end. I would like to know whether you would allow me 20 minutes right now, because I would take them right now.