Judy Wasylycia-Leis

[Health Care, November 20th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the Deputy Prime Minister says he wants to talk about social policy. Let me ask him then about the fact that the OECD has set a standard for all nations that 75% of health spending should be public spending. Canada used to meet that standard but not any more.

The president of the Canadian Health Association said “That seems to be what we had until the cuts started to take place at the federal and provincial levels. They sort of created a path towards privatization”.

Does the Deputy Prime Minister agree with his wife that government cuts starting at the federal level pave the way to privatization of health care in Canada?

[National Child Day, November 20th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, today is national child day and sadly there are still far too many children living in poverty in this country. Despite a unanimous resolution in this House in 1989 to eliminate child poverty by the year 2000, there are 1.5 million children living in poverty.

Each day in Canada millions of children roll out of bed in substandard housing or shelters with empty stomachs and empty hopes.

Yesterday the Minister of Finance had a revelation about child poverty. He finally discovered that there is third world poverty in the country and called child poverty a national disgrace.

Yet it is this government's cuts to social programs that have pushed half a million more children into poverty since the Liberals were elected in 1993. With only 14 months to go until the year 2000, New Democrats call on the finance minister to introduce measures to eliminate child poverty come hell or high water and end the national disgrace of child poverty.

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, for the member to dismiss the concerns we have raised today does a great disservice to the thousands of people in Canada who are very concerned about the care they are receiving or who are very worried about whether care will be there when they need it. It is not a partisan request for doctors, nurses, hospitals and health care organizations to come forward with one voice to say that this government owes it to our health care system to put $2.5 billion immediately back into it. That request is truly in the interest of preserving something we all believe in.

Does the member acknowledge that Canada is now 17th among 28 industrialized OECD nations in terms of public spending on health care? Does he acknowledge the federal share of that public spending is now down to 14%, if we are lucky? Is he ready to acknowledge a report of the Canadian Institute for Health Information covered by the media today which stated that private sector health spending now represents over 30% of this country's total health bill?

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am tempted to ask my colleague, the Conservative health critic, a question about the metamorphosis of the Conservative Party, since we all know that the huge cuts in transfers began with the Mulroney Conservative government. However, I think that issue has been dealt with.

I would simply ask the member, since he is very familiar with the whole area of costs as a result of things like tobacco, is it not a factor here that we are dealing with a government that is not only cutting huge amounts out of the transfer payments, but is also contributing to the costs in the health care system by not dealing effectively with tobacco addiction and not dealing with proactive legislation dealing with the tobacco industry?

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that there is some common ground. We all are committed to convincing the Liberal government to reinvest in health care.

I am very concerned, though, about the clearly enunciated policies of the Reform Party around approval for a parallel private health care system. That would be absolutely the death of medicare, no matter how much money the federal government could be convinced to put into the system.

The Reform Party has not fully thought through what allowing for a two tier health care system would mean. I urge them to consider that position and to look at working together to preserve a universally accessible, publicly administered single tier system which is the envy of the world, in particular the envy of the United States. This was recently clearly stated by physicians from that country who said “Don't lose what you have”. We fought hard to get medicare. Do not let them take it away.

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, once again the Liberals are playing games with statistics. We know very well that the $1.5 billion they like to tout as some new money injected into health care is just nonsense.

All the government did was not move ahead on a cut that was promised for this year. We are still dealing with a base of $12.5 billion. That is $2.5 billion short of the $15 billion in the system when the government brought in its drastic changes and cutbacks in 1995.

Let us deal with the facts. Let us also remember that when it came to the origins of medicare, it was under a Liberal government that the Canada Health Act was brought in. History will not dispute that if it were not for the pressure and work of the CCF and NDP, people like Stanley Knowles and Tommy Douglas, the Liberals would not have acted. It took that kind of pressure to make it happen across the country.

Some would even say that the Liberals had to be dragged kicking and screaming to bring in this program. Today we have a Liberal government that is dismantling health care. I tell the member that we will make sure we do everything to keep the Liberals from eroding and killing medicare, even if it means taking them kicking and screaming to that point.

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to participate in this debate. I indicate at the outset the support by the New Democratic Party for the ideas and the concept behind this resolution.

Today we are dealing with the number one issue facing the Canadian people, the number one issue that should be before parliament. I commend the Bloc for bringing this issue forward and want to indicate how I feel we need to devote our time and effort to address this most critical issue.

I also want to set the record straight. It is very important to do so in the face of the comments by Liberal members over the last number of days. They are suggesting, implying, that Liberals are in fact the pioneers of medicare and the greatest defenders of medicare at the very time when they are responsible for the demise of this very important universal program for all of Canada.

It is absolutely appalling and unacceptable for us to sit in the Chamber and hear the words of the Minister of Health and to see that kind of mischievous behaviour when in fact it is the policies of the government that have clearly put us in the difficult position we are in today.

I also want to set the record straight when it comes to the Reform Party. The Reform Party likes to evoke the name of Tommy Douglas on a regular basis. In one breath it talks about Tommy Douglas and in the same breath it talks about support for a two tier, parallel private health care system.

That was the antithesis of everything Tommy Douglas stood for and everything the CCF and the NDP fought for when they brought forward the idea of a universally accessible, publicly administered single tier health care system. Let us not forget that and let us not be fooled by the Reform Party. It pretends to be great defenders of medicare when it is firmly committed to destroying medicare as we know it today. Let us juxtapose the comments of both the Liberals and the Reformers with the rhetoric we have heard from previous and present Liberal and Reform members.

Let me remind Liberal members that when we went through the big fight 30 years ago to get a universal health insurance program they were the biggest obstacles to that whole development. I refer specifically to a Liberal MLA in the province of Manitoba who actually said that state medicine was a Frankenstein that people had created. That member went on to say that the medical professionals would soon be sucked into the jaws of a voracious socialist monster. We have to compare that to what members of the Reform have said in the House, in particular one member who said “I can get better health care in Florida than in socialized Canada”.

Canadians have to remember who is standing up for medicare. We have to think very hard about convincing both Liberals and Reformers about what we truly mean by medicare and what has to be done. Since we are setting the record straight with respect to the pioneers of medicare, I remind members of the words of Tommy Douglas because they are the essence of what we are dealing with:

Had I been a rich man's son the services of the finest surgeons would have been available. As an iron moulder's boy, I almost had my leg amputated before chance intervened and a specialist cured me without thought of a fee. All my adult life I have dreamed of the day when an experience like mine would be impossible and we would have in Canada a program of complete medical care without a price tag. And that is what we aim to achieve—the finest health service available to everyone regardless of ability to pay.

That is the origin of medicare. That is what we are trying to protect. Let me also remind members of the House about the words of Stanley Knowles who passed away almost a year and a half ago. He was also one of the strongest defenders of medicare. I quote from his speech in Gimli, Manitoba, in 1958:

The day will come when never again will any man, woman or child in Canada have to worry about a hospital bill, a doctor's bill or other health costs.

This is the aim and purpose of the overall health insurance which this party advocates. He went on to say:

Will there be any loss of freedom when all health care is available as one needs it? On the contrary, this will mark the beginning of a new and greater freedom, freedom from worry over health costs, freedom to enjoy the best health that medical sciences can make available to our people.

That is the legacy that we are trying to carry on today. We are faced with enormous pressures and obstacles from the Liberal government and the official opposition, the Reform Party. Our party will be devoting our time in parliament to preserve medicare and to do whatever we can to ensure that we maintain the idea of a universally accessible publicly administered single tier system.

It will not be easy. All we have to do is look at the situation today. We know the facts. We have heard over and over again how consecutive Liberal and Conservative governments at the federal level have eaten away at payments for health care. We know that this Liberal government took the biggest chunk out of health care spending in the history of medicare in 1995 when it introduced the Canada health and social transfer. We know about the $7 billion that it eliminated. We know the impact that had on health care systems across the country. We only have to open our newspapers wherever we may live to find out just what is happening.

I refer to an article that appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press yesterday. It talks about how nurses are in tears because they are overworked, stressed out and not able to provide the quality care they envisage giving to their patients.

Whether we are talking about long waiting lists for diagnostic services, overcrowded emergency rooms, hospital beds being cut, or people being released from hospital without home care services, we know it is a result of serious cuts in health care spending that has happened across the country by the federal government and by many provincial governments.

I think specifically of my province of Manitoba where the provincial Conservative government has worked hand in hand with the cutback agenda of the federal government and has contributed to a very inadequate health care system. This is a very scary situation for the people of Manitoba.

The same can be said for the provinces of Alberta, Ontario and many others where governments are not committed to putting resources into health care and to trying to move the system to a holistic, preventive health care system.

All provinces are now saying the same thing. They are all saying that we need to stabilize the health care system. We need an immediate reinvestment in the transfer payments for health care. Not only are the provinces saying this, but for the first time in our history every major health care organization, every stakeholder, is saying the same.

In the last few days we have been lobbied by all major groups: the Health Action Lobby representing 27 national health and community organizations; the Canadian Health Care Association representing 1,000 regional health authorities, hospitals, health facilities and health service agencies; the Canadian Medical Association representing 46,000 doctors; the Canadian Nurses Association representing 11 provincial and territorial nurses associations; the National Federation of Nurses' Unions representing three-quarters of health care providers in our system that are nurses, thousands and thousands of nurses on the frontline; and the Canadian Health Coalition which has been fighting desperately to wake up the government to the need to restabilize our system and move forward.

It is clear that the opinion in the country is united and unanimous. There is only one message the government must hear. It must hear it today and must act immediately. As a minimum $2.5 billion must be put immediately into the transfer payments for health care to stabilize the system, to deal with the crises that we are all hearing about and perhaps deal with ourselves on a personal basis, and to bring some order to the system so that we can then build upon a solid foundation, go forward and implement the important goals we have talked about and heard about time and time again from the Liberals: the idea of a national home care plan and a national drug plan.

We cannot go forth with those important ideas until we stabilize the system and have the commitment of the federal government to work in co-operation with provincial and territorial governments to ensure we have the ability to go forward.

Let me conclude by bringing us back to our origins, to the pioneers of health care and specifically the words of Tommy Douglas. Let us not forget the true meaning of those words and the kind of direction he gave all of us. He said that he would not allow for the demise of medicare:

—because when we're talking about universal health care, we're talking about our sense of values and asking the questions: Do we think human life is important? On what moral basis should the wealthy receive greater access to medical care? Why should a stockbroker have more discretion over something as vital as health care than a teacher or a non-wealthy mother of four?

The only answer for you and me is that the best medicare which is available is something to which people are entitled by virtue of belonging to a civilized community.

[Points Of Order, November 18th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this serious discussion of whether or not Bill S-13 is in order to be pursued in this Chamber.

The member for St. Paul's has put forward some very compelling arguments about why first reading of Bill S-13 would be in order without a royal recommendation. I recommend them to you, Mr. Speaker.

I bring to your attention the specific authority mentioned earlier to help you in your considerations. Erskine May's 21st edition, at page 716, is clear when it states:

The imposition of charges on funds other than the Consolidated Fund or the National Loans Fund does not require the royal recommendation, unless it involves an increased payment out of one or other of those Funds, or increases the liability... upon them, or automatically attracts a grant for moneys provided by Parliament.

The Speaker of the Senate deemed the bill not to have required royal recommendation and therefore sent the bill to this Chamber quite properly according to the rules as they now stand.

Today the government wishes to raise a constitutional principle of money bills not originating in the Senate. Following my Liberal colleague's comments I will also refer to Beauchesne's, page 97, citation 324. These citations deal very much with the House leader's reference to Bourinot's mention of two principles outlined on page 491. The two citations on page 97 and 98 are citations 324 and 325. Citation 324 says:

The Speaker will not give a decision upon a constitutional question nor decide a question of law, though the same may be raised on a point of order or privilege.

Citation 325 says:

In all matters of doubt, the Speaker will consider attentively the opinions of Members. Sometimes, instead of expressing an opinion of either side, the Speaker may ask instructions from the House or reserve his decision on the point of discussion, or suggest that the House may, if it thinks proper, dispense with the Standing Order in a particular case. In doubtful cases, the Speaker will be guided largely by circumstances.

The powers of the Senate are not the only procedural issue at stake here. It would be very useful for us and for you, Mr. Speaker, to consider the broad procedural history of the way tobacco legislation has been treated by the governmental institutions of the country.

Let us remember that the current round of the Tobacco Act, of which in effect Bill S-13 is a part, resulted from the fact that the supreme court ruled that sections of the Tobacco Act were unconstitutional because it held that the government had not provided enough evidence of the public health benefits of the act to infringe upon the free speech rights of tobacco companies. In essence, the court placed the burden of proof on governments if they wish to regulate the advertising of addictive drugs to children. The court effectively gave the act of convincing children to become addicted to a health damaging drug the constitutional protection of free speech.

Earlier the government ignored its deadline in the Tobacco Act for the introduction of tighter regulations on tobacco sponsorships. It has acted as if an agreement it had struck in private with the tobacco companies had the force of law. I brought this matter to your attention, Mr. Speaker, in a point of privilege on September 30, 1998.

It is also worth pointing out that the government is seeking to pursue a technicality to trump a badly needed public health measure to protect children. At the same time it refuses to take effective measures to enforce existing laws against the sale of tobacco to children and is therefore collecting some $80 million a year from the sale of tobacco to children.

If the government is concerned about technicality and is preoccupied with procedure and formality then there is clearly one area where the government should be focusing its attention. It clearly should be looking at technicalities around the enforcement of laws today which restrict the sale of tobacco to young people.

Throughout this sad episode all the legal, constitutional and procedural cards have been stacked against those who want to improve public health and in favour of those who seek to profit from selling an addictive poison.

I ask you, Mr. Speaker, to keep this in mind in your decision, because I think we truly are dealing with a grey matter in terms of procedures and constitutional and legal issues around Bill S-13 before us today. Given that the precise occasions requiring a royal recommendation and the definition of a money bill are in that grey area of procedure and history of procedure in the House, I ask you to give the benefit of the doubt to those who wish to advance the cause of our children's health.

As my final point it is worth mentioning that it is curious indeed that the government, in rising on this point of order, actually has expressed concerns about the democratic rights of the elected Commons versus the rights of the unelected Senate.

Certainly it is causing us some concern because we know this is a government that resurrected the undemocratic practice of routinely introducing government bills in the Senate before the House, something which the New Democratic Party has vigorously protested.

This is the government that has steadfastly refused to act upon calls from the New Democratic Party and millions of Canadians to scrap the unelected Senate, so we think it is rather inappropriate at this point to be focusing so much in terms of constitutional issues and the origins of a bill from the Senate. We believe that the government cannot have it both ways. It cannot use the Senate when it finds it convenient to do so and then hide behind it when it does not want to proceed with a particular measure.

I conclude with the most important message I think all of us concerned about Bill S-13 are raising today, and that is we are procedurally dealing with a grey area. We need to look very much at the circumstances surrounding the bill and the history of tobacco legislation in the country. We need to very much consider the public interest and the health of children in these deliberations. I recommend that position to you, Mr. Speaker.

[Tobacco, November 18th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, for the record, on June 3 the minister said “S-13 is a good bill, a clever bill, a valid bill and I think we should go forward with it”. But he also said interestingly that there is some institutional resistance to the idea of a 50 cents a carton levy on the tobacco industry.

I want to ask the minister today, is that resistance coming from his own government?

[Tobacco, November 18th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, on June 3, 1998 the health minister said publicly that he supports the principles of Bill S-13. He said it is a clever bill and it ties money from smoking to prevention programs.

This past Monday the minister refused to answer a question about his intentions with respect to a levy on cartons of cigarettes.

I ask the minister, and I hope that he does not evade the question today, does the minister still believe that a levy of 50 cents a carton for prevention purposes is a good thing or not?