John Oliver

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, I want to be very clear. The government is not looking at legalizing or decriminalizing any illegal drugs. Cannabis has already been addressed in Canada. As I said earlier, decriminalization does not ensure a safe quality supply of drugs. However, we are making much easier for care providers and others to get expanded access to alternative drugs other than opioids.

We have expanded access to methadone, opioid replacement therapies and diacetylmorphine, which is a pharmaceutical grade heroin, to try to provide alternative solutions for people with opioid addictions. Those are the steps we are taking.

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, I thank my hon. colleague for her work on this file. It is a bit rich. For the entire term of the Harper government, the Conservatives did everything they could to suppress and drive down investments and harm reduction in treatment centres. In fact, they made it almost impossible to open safe consumption sites across Canada.

In budget 2017, we invested $100 million over five years to enhance efforts related to harm reduction and to strengthen the evidence base. In budget 2018, $231.4 million were additionally added to establish the emergency treatment fund, develop a national public education campaign, enhance the ability of front-line personnel to address, detect and intercept illegal drugs at the border and to accelerate and expand a timely national public health data and analysis system.

In our three years, we have moved this program far forward. Over 1,100 overdoses were successfully treated on site at these consumption sites. This government is making a difference. We have the right plan and we are moving forward with it. We need Conservative governments across Canada to get on board and help with harm reduction.

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, I thank my hon. colleague for his work on health committee and for the efforts he is making to address this problem in a proactive way.

As I said earlier, decriminalization would not ensure a safe drug supply. It means that if one is found with drugs, the individual would not be charged criminally, but it would not ensure a safe drug supply. It would not solve the stigma problem that is a barrier to people seeking treatment. Decriminalization would not boost access to treatment centres. As I referenced earlier, Portugal's former head of drug policy has said that decriminalization is not a silver bullet to solve the crisis.

We need to start on the basics, so that is what we are doing. W are responding by restoring harm reduction. We have opened over two dozen supervised consumption sites. We have invested over $200 million in treatment centres. We are fast-tracking regulatory action to cut red tape.

We are all on the same page on this one. We need to ensure that Canadians, when they are ready to seek treatment, have access to treatment.

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, the opioid overdose crisis in Canada is a public health crisis of the highest priority. Our government is committed to taking an evidence-based, comprehensive public health approach to save lives, reduce harms and provide treatment and other support to people who use drugs.

We are taking action through the Canadian drugs and substances strategy, the federal government's approach to drug and substance use, which was first announced in December 2016. The Canadian drugs and substances strategy reflects a health focused approach to drug policy, is grounded in evidence-based decision-making and includes harm reduction as a key pillar, alongside prevention, treatment and enforcement.

Tonight, my comments will highlight some of the evidence-based harm reduction measures we are taking under the strategy to address the opioid crisis. In particular, I will outline the importance of supervised consumption sites as evidence-based interventions and key components of our emergency response. Finally, I will highlight a number of other innovative approaches that have been undertaken to help reduce harms from problematic opioid use in Canada.

There is a growing consensus in Canada that problematic substance use is a health issue that requires a public health response. As such, the Canadian drugs and substances strategy is a comprehensive, collaborative and compassionate approach to drug policy and uses a public health lens when addressing substance use issues. Harm reduction aims to improve the health and well-being of people who use drugs, while at the same time helping them to make connections with important health and social services, including treatment providers.

In addition to existing funding, in budget 2017, our government announced an additional investment of $100 million over five years and $22.7 million ongoing to support the Canadian drugs and substances strategy. That includes $30 million over five years for the harm reduction fund for community based initiatives to support needle exchange and other critical evidence-based harm reduction measures to help reduce rates of hepatitis C and HIV from sharing of drug use equipment.

I would now like to move specifically to our government's support for supervised consumption sites under the Canadian drugs and substances strategy.

In May 2017, the federal government streamlined the application process to establish supervised consumption sites to help support their establishment in the communities they were needed in. As of early December 2018, there are 28 operating supervised consumption sites across the country, working day in and day out to help save lives.

International and Canadian evidence has shown that supervised consumption sites are an effective harm reduction measure. When properly established and maintained, these sites have health and social benefits for individuals and the community at large, without discernible negative impacts on public health or safety.

Supervised consumption sites reduce the transmission of communicable diseases, decrease infections, reduce emergency room use and hospital admissions related to injection drug use and decrease overdose deaths. In addition, supervised consumption sites provide access to other health and social services for people who use drugs, including opportunities to pursue drug treatment programs for those who are ready.

Data reported to Health Canada also shows that over the last 18 months supervised consumption sites in Canada have had over 125,000 visits and over 1,100 reported overdoses on site without a single death. In addition, these sites distributed over 2,600 naloxone kits, helping to get this life-saving medication into the hands of the people who needed it.

Cost-benefit studies demonstrate that by reducing behaviours like needle sharing and by preventing overdose deaths, supervised consumption sites result in savings to the health care system that far outweigh the costs of their operation.

Recognizing the need for rapid access to front-line services, the federal government has also facilitated the establishment of temporary overdose prevention sites. Overdose prevention sites provide short-term harm reduction services and operate on the basis of a class exemption provided by the federal government under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, and are authorized to address an urgent public health need related to drug overdoses.

We also know that while harm reduction measures are vital, a number of other critical interventions are required. For example, a range of evidence-based treatment options need to be easily and readily accessible for those who are ready to seek treatment services.

In terms of treatment for problematic substance use, our government has committed $150 million for an emergency treatment fund to help improve the availability of treatment options in Canada. In addition, our government has made a number of investments in recent federal budgets to support expanded mental health and drug treatment services in first nations and Inuit communities, including $200 million over five years and $40 million ongoing provided in budget 2018.

Our government is also committed to exploring new and innovative approaches to address the opioid crisis to help reduce harms from problematic substance use. We continue to lose lives to drug overdoses every day and we need to explore new and promising approaches.

That is why in November 2017, Canada began allowing drug checking services to be performed at supervised consumption sites that wished to offer that service. Drug checking allows people who use drugs to make informed choices by having additional information on what may be in their drugs, including the presence of highly toxic substances like fentanyl that are driving the overdose crisis we are currently seeing in Canada.

We have made naloxone, a drug used to temporarily reverse an opioid overdose, available without prescription in Canada. We have passed the Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act that encourages people to seek help in the event of an overdose by providing some legal protection for those who experience or witness an overdose.

Another key component to harm reduction is addressing stigma toward people who use drugs. For people who use substances, stigma can have many negative effects, including feelings of isolation and helplessness; discriminatory treatment by society; and the creation of barriers to accessing quality health care or social services that other Canadians enjoy freely. Our government is committed to reducing stigma toward people who use drugs and will be rolling out a campaign in early 2019 to help inform the public about stigma and what people can do to help reduce it.

Our government remains committed to doing everything it can to reduce overdoses and to save lives. To do this, we will continue to work closely with provincial and territorial counterparts, with people with lived and living experience with drug use and other stakeholders to help ensure that evidence-based harm reduction services are available for Canadians that want them and need them.

The evidence is clear that harm reduction works to help protect people who use drugs from overdose deaths, improve their health and well-being and connect them to other important services like treatment, housing, training and other important social supports. There is no trade-off between harm reduction and other interventions like treatment or prevention. They work best when they work together in a combined way.

Our government is committed to addressing this crisis in a way that is collaborative, comprehensive, compassionate and evidence-based.

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, I wanted to thank the hon. member for her thoughtful remarks and for her hard work on the health committee as vice-chair and for the great representation she provides at that committee.

There were a number of very thoughtful recommendations brought forward in her address. I want to touch on a few of them. She mentioned border security. I thought she might want to know that more than 42 grams of fentanyl and its analogs, nine million lethal doses, were stopped and seized at the border between April 2016 and September 2016.

In terms of education, we are requiring mandatory labels on all prescription opioids so that people are aware of what they are buying and the risks of what they are buying. We are moving to severely restrict the marketing of opioids to medical professionals and are creating a dedicated team to crack down on offenders.

It has been three years. This has been a problem for about 12 years. The failure to act, in fact the suppression of harm reduction strategies during the Harper government's time, is what we are really dealing with now. We are trying to play catch-up. We have made amazing investments in three years, and we are starting to make a difference. There have been 1,100 overdoses already treated at our safe consumption sites.

Could the member reflect on those lost years and what could be done to try to avoid that happening again?

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Madam Chair, I want to thank my hon. colleague for his passionate work at the health committee and the work that he took on with the health committee when a study was done of the opioid crisis.

I want to ask my colleague to reflect a bit on decriminalization. Decriminalization does not ensure a safe drug supply. Decriminalization does not make people seek treatment. Decriminalization does not solve the stigma problem that leads to people not moving forward.

Thus, the government is responding through evidence-based programs. Portugal's former head of drug policy has said that “decriminalization is not a silver bullet” to solve this crisis.

We are restoring harm reduction. We have opened supervised consumption sites. We are investing over $200 million in treatment centres, much of which has gone to British Columbia. We are fast-tracking regulatory action to cut red tape.

My question to my hon. colleague is this. Does he not agree that harm reduction and moving forward to encourage people to seek treatment as well as taking some of these other strategies are the building blocks to help resolve this crisis?

[Opioid Crisis in Canada, December 10th, 2018]

Mr. Chair, like my hon. colleague's experience in his riding, I think all of us in all our ridings across Canada are seeing the increasing consequence of the opioid burden in our communities.

However, I did want to remind the members that in 2011, the previous Harper government tried to revoke support for the one and only safe consumption site in Canada, Insite. It fought it in the Supreme Court to close it down. Insite won, but it was the only existing harm reduction site that existed when the Conservatives lost power. They removed the harm reduction pillar from the drug strategy and moved the lead to justice. They took an enforcement and law and order strategy, which led to criminalization, which leads to stigma and the fact that many people now are reluctant to come forward and identify as having dependencies.

I am curious if the hon. member could reflect on the policies of that government. Is he happy to see the harm reduction moving forward? Is he happy to see over $300 million now committed for treatment and harm reduction programs and a focus on public health instead of criminalization?

[Health, December 3rd, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, we are deeply concerned about the reports of serious issues being faced by Canadians with implanted medical devices. We are assessing the risk, quality and effectiveness of health products before they are used. We are bringing forward an action plan on medical devices that will strengthen the processes used to improve them, improve oversight once they are approved and give Canadians more information and more transparency.

Unlike the Harper Conservatives who shuttered Canada's bureau of medical devices in 2010, we are rebuilding this and making sure Canadians are kept safe when they use medical devices.

[Poverty Reduction Act, November 30th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, reflecting on my community of Oakville, as of 2016, 25% of households in the town of Oakville are spending 30% or more of their income on housing costs, 11% of households were in core housing need, and 50% of new housing sales were at prices below an affordable threshold.

It is safe to say that the national housing strategy, the first one of its kind, has already started and that some of the important work that we needed done to achieve Canada's poverty reduction targets is already under way, with many more to come.

Because my colleague was looking for concrete actions on the national poverty strategy, could she reflect on the national housing strategy and the improvements she will be seeing in her own riding from that initiative?

[Postal Services Resumption and Continuation Act, November 22nd, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, there is no question that our government has made huge strides for organized labour and Canadian workers.

We repealed Bill C-525 and Bill C-377 to restore fair and balanced labour relations. have amended the Canada Labour Code. We are modernizing labour standards. Now we are forced to look at this Canada Post situation.

It has been interesting to hear the conversations in the House. I have heard from my NDP colleagues that we should be doing nothing and let the collective process drag out through a very critical business cycle. I have heard from the member across who said that we should have acted earlier.

Does the member not see the value of collective bargaining? Does he not see the value of a allowing a mutually agreeable process to unfold so that these two parties can come together one last time in a mutually satisfactory way?