John Duncan

[Fisheries, September 20th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, we cannot have two sets of rules. In Malpeque Bay the minister is legitimizing illegal fishing by calling it a deal.

Yesterday the minister said that he would not use deals as a shield for unauthorized activities, but he is and he has. How many other of the 29 deals are shams like the Malpeque Bay deal?

[Fisheries, September 20th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, the minister brags that 29 out of 34 bands in the maritimes have signed fishing agreements. He suggests that if only Burnt Church would sign on that would end the problem.

The reality is quite different. The Lennox Island Band agreement was for 20,000 pounds in Malpeque Bay. DFO sources say they have now fished more than double that and they are still fishing. Why is the minister pretending to protect the lobster resource with meaningless agreements?

[Questions Passed As Orders For Returns, September 18th, 2000]

How much federal money in the form of grants and contributions has gone to assist the fin fish aquaculture business, broken down by province, and by year, for each year since 1994?

Return tabled.

[Supply, June 15th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, we have had much debate today on health care, the subject of the official opposition supply day motion.

I would like to ask the hon. member for Hastings—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington about health in a more general way. It relates to the fact that when people think about medicare and health care services, most often they are thinking about physical health, but in actual fact what has happened in Canada has been a tragedy in terms of mental health care services.

There has been a shrinkage of resources. What the provinces have been able to secure from the federal government, if there has been a prioritization, it has been away from mental health care services. There have been some very tragic examples recently of what has happened. People with obvious and known to themselves mental health problems have been crying out for help but have not been able to receive it. Consequently they have carried out criminal acts.

[Supply, June 15th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, I can only conclude that the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle did not hear my speech because I did touch on basically all of those issues and I do support the $4.2 billion.

The one concern I have with the member's comment deals with what I call the mantra of the single payer system from the standpoint that if there is not a pre-existing two tier system in Saskatchewan right now, then it is the only province that does not have it. Canadians are buying health care with their own money where they choose because they have no choice but to do so.

[Supply, June 15th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, I did touch on that initiative in my speech and I do support it. I think the provinces are actually doing things in a vacuum from the standpoint that the federal government should actually be the one providing the leadership for that.

When the premier of Saskatchewan was asked that question last night, he said the same thing. He agreed and was hoping that the province of Saskatchewan's initiative would move the federal government to show leadership and launch a similar national review. We agree with that.

The provinces are doing things that they have no choice but to do at this point because they have a disproportionate share of the burden. It has all happened in a hurry. They have had to increase their spending and take on added responsibilities at a time when the cost of delivering health care was escalating anyway. It is crunch time.

[Supply, June 15th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, I think most hon. members would agree it is fair to say that health care is the number one issue for most Canadians. Political parties grapple and posture over the Canada Health Act, medicare and the delivery of health services. The public sees through most of this and in many ways is far ahead of the political parties in terms of understanding the major problems in health care.

For example, I was in Nova Scotia last week and met a middle aged woman with undiagnosed recent loss of feeling in her midsection and legs. This is obviously a major concern to her and to her family. The doctor's office triumphantly phoned her to say that it had obtained an appointment for her for an MRI on November 5, five months away. These Canadians will be forced to go to Bangor, Maine, and pay approximately $2,500 on demand for an MRI. Any reasonable analysis would conclude it should be a priority necessity of health care delivery. This is not an isolated story. This story could be replicated across the country. In B.C. they would go to Seattle or to Spokane rather than to Bangor, Maine, and so on from west to east.

The public knows full well that there is rationing and that is a two tier system is in play big time already. Politicians who close their eyes or reject this reality are doing a great disservice. We have seen evidence of that happening here today.

The answer for Canada lies in harnessing the best delivery mechanisms for all Canadians at a cost society can afford. No Canadian should be denied basic health care delivery. Nor should Canadians who wish to step outside the public health care delivery system be told they cannot do so. We do not tell the Vancouver Canucks, the Toronto Maple Leafs or the Montreal Canadiens that their hockey clubs cannot have their private hyperbaric chambers or that they cannot have their team doctor, do we?

I will reiterate the official opposition supply day motion:

That this House recognize the health care system of Canada is in crisis, the status quo is not an option, and the system that we have today is not sustainable; and, accordingly, that this House call on the government to develop a plan to modernize the Canadian health care system, and work with the provinces to encourage positive co-operative relations.

That is a reasonable and progressive motion. Yet the Minister of Health has already indicated the government will not buy into supporting it.

The Liberals are health care hypocrites and hypocrites generally. The 1997 Liberal red book stated that the Liberals would not allow a two tier health care system and that they were committed to a continuing role in the financing of medicare.

What is the Liberal track record on financing health care? The provinces know their federal transfers have been cut since 1993. The Liberals spin the numbers and say, “Well, no, not really”. Meanwhile, the naked truth is that the Liberals cut health care to avoid other program reductions in the 1990s in order to balance the annual budget. The deficit was eliminated by the finance minister by off-loading a bigger burden for medicare onto the provinces, and the Liberals have never made good for those cuts.

Now the Liberals want to portray themselves as the great defenders of medicare and place impossible constraints on the provinces. The provinces are in an increasingly difficult set of circumstances and we are witnessing some things that are coming from that. We have bill 11 in Alberta. The Saskatchewan health care review was announced yesterday. All the provinces are demanding that the federal government reinstate funding to 1993 levels before the provincial governments will co-operate on other issues with the federal government.

Health care delivery is a provincial responsibility. The only way to focus on the patient is to encourage the provinces and the federal government to check their politics at the door and concentrate on stabilizing the funding and modernizing the Canada Health Act. This will only happen through innovation on the part of provinces and a flexible federal government that provides freedom to the provinces to push ahead.

Here is a partial strategy that we should consider. The provinces need leadership from the federal government to help orchestrate change. Respecting the existing jurisdictional framework is the surest way to begin building a sustainable, enviable health care system. The long term funding base must be restored. The provinces are calling for a $4.2 billion annual increase.

The feds must initiate relations with the provinces to support and encourage a health care system that works in the best interests of Canadians. Co-operation is the key but that is not what we have been seeing coming from the government recently, in particular from the minister. We must dedicate our efforts to a universal, portable, comprehensive and accessible health care system. Does that remind you of the Canada Health Act, Madam Speaker? It certainly does to me.

We must examine the roles of administration for better efficiency, productiveness, and overall better service for the patient. We must create standards and independent auditing for greater transparency and delivery of health care. Without that transparency we do not have accountability.

Our present health care delivery system has one fatal flaw: the average consumer who utilizes that service has no idea what that service actually costs. If the consumer does not know that, most often the deliverer does not know that either. One cannot begin to reform a system until both sides of that equation are well aware of what the costs are. Canadians deserve no less. Health care hypocrites, like the Minister of Health, should actually get out of the way.

I now want to review the five basic principles of the Canada Health Act, in particular the accessibility provisions. In 1993 we had an average wait of 9.3 weeks and in 1998 it went up to 13.3 weeks. People are waiting up to nine months to see a specialist. We are also losing on the technology front.

Earlier I gave an example of what is happening with MRI waiting lists in Canada and how different it is from the U.S. We are failing on that score.

In terms of universality, I have pointed out in this place and in correspondence how remote communities are so discriminated against in terms of their ability to access health care. Very often it is the federal government, which is removing federal infrastructure, that is actually working against the universality of health care provision by its other actions. I have a major concern on that front. The government is really not addressing that and, in many ways, is discriminating against remote communities.

The final thing I want to talk about is public administration. Eighty per cent of health care costs are labour component, whether it is doctors, nurses or administrators, and we must look at that whole area in a constructive fashion.

[National Parks, June 14th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, Kejimkujik National Park is the most heavily infested gypsy moth area in Nova Scotia. The moth destroys our forests because it is not native to North America and has no natural predators. The spread of this insect threatens the forest industry.

The federal government has a mandate for forest health and the responsibility to act but is lacking the will. The root of the problem appears to be a philosophical resistance to the control of an introduced pest in a national park.

One observer, who has managed local gypsy moth control measures, told me that if he had the federal money to eradicate this moth that has been spent on travelling around to study the problem, there would not be a problem.

The province is taking firm control measures for the brown spruce longhorn beetle in Point Pleasant Park in Halifax. When is the federal government going to do the same thing to control the gypsy moth in the national park?

[Committees Of The House, June 8th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), the committee recommends that it be granted leave to travel to Norway and Scotland during the month of April 2001 to continue its comprehensive study on aquaculture; that the committee be composed of two Canadian Alliance members, one Bloc member, one NDP member, one PC member and five Liberals; and that the necessary staff do accompany the committee.

[Cape Breton Development Corporation Divestiture Authorization And Dissolution Act, June 2nd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to the Devco bill.

I believe there are many elements of the government that have a bias against the Canadian coal industry. That is a very unfortunate circumstance. It derives, to a fair degree, from an image problem. There is a conceptual thought in many people's minds that somehow coal is dirty and that coal and greenhouse gas emissions are related. That is a very unfortunate circumstance for this important resource.

I want to talk about the development of the bill from a parliamentary standpoint. I met with department officials last year to receive a briefing on the bill, and I am not satisfied with the way the system works. I realize that we are talking about Group No. 1 amendments, but one of the amendments today virtually mirrors an amendment I made at committee. Therefore, it is a good amendment. I thought that amendment would come from the government. I refer to Motion No. 3, which is one of the amendments in Group No. 1.

The reason I believed that was because I thought we had somewhat of a meeting of the minds when department officials and people like myself, who had political considerations, met for early discussions on the bill before it went to second reading. I had the belief that an amendment would be forthcoming from the government.

That never happened. Nothing changed and there was no bureaucratic follow-up.

I see this as something that is structurally wrong. When there appears to be a legitimate opposition concern, particularly about expenditure controls or the way government disposes of assets, or about protecting taxpayer interests, we should not be put in a position as opposition members of bureaucratic convenience, indifference or political interference. I do not know what to attribute it to. However, there is absolutely no follow-up on what appears to be a legitimate problem.

In any case, none of that happened. I certainly was not happy with that at committee. I am once again not happy today. What we have is the very same bill presented today which was presented last fall, and there has been absolutely no entertainment by the government to change a word in the bill.

I am sure the government is concerned about getting it through parliament before we recess. However, it was the government which decided it did not want to bring the bill forward until very recently. It has had the legislation, as we all know, for quite a long time.

It should not have been a surprise to me to go to committee this week to find that the opposition members from all parties were basically redundant from the standpoint that the government would not entertain a single change.

I tried to put myself in the shoes of a government member, protecting whatever the interest is that they believe they are protecting. I could not determine why the government would not look seriously at a lot of the amendments and try to negotiate something with the opposition. That simply is not the way this government likes to operate. The process in many respects is very much a sham.

That does not only apply to this bill. However, it became very apparent to me that that was what was happening. As there will be many people affected, as has been pointed out quite well by the member for Bras d'Or—Cape Breton, I do not think that is the way to do business.

The Group No. 1 amendments, I believe, are quite supportable for the most part, and we will be supporting them. I want to talk about Motion No. 3 because that motion reflects the motion I put at committee.

In the asset divestiture process this bill will suspend the Financial Administration Act. From the government side, there is some logic to doing that because business confidentiality must be maintained, and if that act were fully in place that would be impossible. We understood that concern.

We also had a major concern, in that there has been a government divestiture of taxpayer assets. There is a track record, a legacy, of political favouritism, political payoffs and other things because the proper arrangement was not in place to ensure it did not occur. We have seen it in some of the Department of National Defence base divestitures and that sort of thing. It is in everyone's interest to ensure that does not happen.

The motion is a strong attempt to have oversight by the auditor general, who is already the auditor for Devco, to ensure that the auditor general's report comes to parliament in a timely fashion. That would put the political masters on notice that they could not express this kind of favouritism to their friends without scrutiny on a timely basis. If the scrutiny is too far down the road, it amounts to non-scrutiny because too much time has elapsed.

This is a really useful amendment. I hope we can convince the government to adopt it. We could not convince it at committee. We could not convince it at the briefings before that. Now we are at the last stage and we have an opportunity to do it at report stage. I am very hopeful that the government will see this as reasonable.

The government response is that this is redundant because it is already going to happen. I do not think it is redundant. Even in the very worst case if it were totally redundant, perhaps with a different timeframe, there is enough concern from all members of the opposition to warrant it. As a taxpayer I would want more than government assurances.

Government members should adopt Motion No. 3 and take another look at how they have treated the whole divestiture of assets. They will wear it if they do not take another look.