Judy Wasylycia-Leis

[Government Response To Petitions, February 18th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I have a point of order under the item Statements by Ministers. It relates to points of order raised earlier about the ability of members in this House to do their jobs responsibly.

It is hard for us to do our job on a critical issue like compensation for hepatitis C victims when the Minister of Health is out there bashing the provinces instead of in here making a statement to this House.

Would it not be in order, Mr. Speaker, for ministers of the crown to bring to this House full details of such critical issues so that we can carry out our duties responsibly?

[Human Deficit, February 18th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance has the gall to talk about dealing with the human deficit. What chutzpah.

This is the government that created the deficit with $7 billion in cuts to health, education and social service. It created it with cuts to employment insurance, training, pensions, the environment, child care and housing.

The results of this inhumane Liberal agenda is a crisis in health care, education, family incomes and communities everywhere.

In Winnipeg today nurses are saying emergency rooms are unsafe with IV bags going dry, vital signs not being checked, health aides working 24-hour shifts and patients waiting long painful hours for treatment.

In the face of these bleeding cuts to the provinces, the health minister is playing politics on hepatitis C compensation instead of showing leadership.

Canadians are sick to death of the human deficit created by this government and some have even given their lives for it. That is too high a price to pay.

[Criminal Code, February 17th, 1998]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to take part in this debate, and I would like to offer my support for the motion by the member for Drummond to prohibit human cloning.

For members of Parliament who struggle on a day to day basis to juggle the competing demands of this job, the idea of human cloning certainly has some appeal.

How many of us have actually said if only I had a clone? I know my young sons Joe and Nick would love for me to be in two places at once. It would help respond to constituents who wonder when I am in Ottawa why I am not in Winnipeg, and when I am in Winnipeg why I am not in Ottawa.

On the other hand the idea of there being two of me, or for that matter there being two of anyone else, is darn scary. Imagine cloning in the case of the Minister of Finance. Unlike the chewing gum which promises to double your pleasure, double your fun, we would have double the cutbacks, double the pain.

What would the world be like if we were able to clone two leaders of the official opposition? Is the world big enough? What would cloning do to the term double talk? What would it all mean?

Carrying on this line of thinking, let me quote from an article written by Patricia Williams that appeared a few days ago in the Citizen . She wrote:

Imagine what the fashion industry could do with a clone with the right bone structure. Like Barbie, you could style humanity so that all the outfits finally fit. Mozart? Give his DNA a few more codas. Bill Gates and Donald Trump? There will be lots of them.

And we will need to clone more lawyers in a world where compatible organs can be “farmed”. Will questions of “harvest rights” be matters of custodial or property presumption in the new litigation of micro-territorial imperative? I paid for that kid, it is my DNA, hand over that kidney now.

It would be fun to pursue this line of argument, to follow through with such fantasy and to continue musing about the possibilities of cloning, if it were not for the fact that this is fast becoming a very serious and a very real issue as identified by the member for Drummond.

Ideas once confined to the realm of science fiction are now fast entering the sphere of possibility. This is not a frivolous issue. It is not a flight of fancy of some far off technology. That point was made very clear many years ago.

It has been noted in the Chamber that this matter has been before us in general terms for many years. The sponsoring of the Royal Commission on Reproductive Technologies a decade ago or more and its final report released in 1993 addressed the issue of cloning of human embryos. This is not a new issue.

The issue before us today is what is taking so long and why is Canada lagging so far behind. It has brought home the urgency of the situation. It has been brought to bear in this Chamber by recent developments, not to mention the sheep and we have all heard the Dolly jokes.

It poses for us a serious situation, especially given the fact that prior to the cloning of sheep in 1993 there were some clear developments when Washington researchers announced the successful cloning of human embryos by separating the cells of a parent embryo. At that time countries responded by banning human cloning based on the separation of human embryos. Certainly no one at that time even fathomed the idea of cloning an adult human cell. It was not thought to be on the horizon.

Today we know, based on scientific inroads in this whole area, that we have a major issue to deal with.

Time is running out. Today we heard from the Liberal member for Thornhill on this general issue almost as if it was something new before us. In fact we have had this debate in the Chamber many times before.

We do not need to reinvent the wheel and start all over again by questioning whether this matter should be in the Criminal Code or whether it should be under some separate legislative authority. The fact of the matter is this place, based on massive consultation with Canadians across the country, has agreed that we need legislation. We need to ban human cloning.

My point today is to make some appeal to the Liberal government to act as quickly as possible to bring forward a redrafted version of Bill C-47 which had very thorough debate and discussion in the Chamber.

There may have been some problems with the bill. We have had time to address those problems. The Minister of Health should not back away from the serious issues before us. He should rapidly consolidate his position, ensure that women's organizations across the country have been informed of any changes to that bill and bring forward a new piece of legislation as soon as possible. We cannot afford inaction on this matter.

As a result of developments that have happened with the cloning of sheep and with the impact of Dr. Seed's statement and claims in the United States, many countries have taken action of late. Some 19 countries in the European Union have moved to officially ban human cloning.

This tells me again that we are late in bringing forward legislation. We are behind the ball in terms of addressing some very serious concerns. I would hope that we will be able to act on that immediately, with the kind of incentive the House has received from the member for Drummond to get on with this debate and given my sense that there appears to be widespread consensus in the Chamber for actually legislating an outright ban of human cloning.

There are many questions to be addressed in this area. Let us draw on the body of advice that was received during the royal commission and in response to Bill C-47 and bring forward comprehensive reproductive technologies legislation as soon as possible. The framework is there. The general philosophical approach is there and we need to act on it.

I conclude by suggesting that drawing on the background material provided to all of us on Bill C-47 we have a comprehensive management regime that could guide us for dealing with this situation and all reproductive technology matters.

That legislation was based on three important principles, three important factors that need to be taken into account. They are the need to address the threat to human dignity, the risk to human health and safety, and other serious social and ethical issues; the dangers of commercialization of human reproduction in particular for women and children; and finally the need to ensure that the best interests of children affected by such technologies and transactions are taken into account. We have the basis. Let us act.

[Health Care, February 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance.

A woman died in an emergency room after a four hour wait. A woman raped at knifepoint was turned away from an emergency room. Canadians clearly favour an increase in medicare funding so these tragedies do not repeat themselves.

Will the Minister of Finance act on the advice enclosed in the alternative federal budget and other proposals for change and restore federal health transfers to 1995 levels?

[Questions On The Order Paper, February 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, before we grant leave for all questions to stand, I would like to raise a point of order and ask the parliamentary secretary a question that I have asked in the past and that I am still curious about.

When will I be able to get an answer to a question that I tabled on September 23?

I had mentioned this issue on December 3, well after the 45 day allotment when we should normally expect a reply. It is now February 9, more than 100 sitting days after the time the question was tabled. I would like to get some clarification from the parliamentary secretary about this delay. The matter was very serious. It asked about the plans that the government and the Minister of Health have for expending $50 million on education and other programs to reduce youth smoking.

I am seeking clarification on this urgent issue. We need the information.

[Multilateral Agreement On Investment, February 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister for International Trade talks about a consensus on the MAI.

He should know that there certainly was no consensus at the health committee about the ability of government to protect medicare from the commercial forces of the MAI. In fact he should know there is a growing consensus in Canada that the government should kill the MAI before the MAI kills medicare.

For the sake of medicare alone, would the international trade minister reconsider his attachment to the MAI?

[The Late David Orlikow, February 4th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I feel extremely privileged to be able to pay tribute to our dear friend and colleague, David Orlikow. I do so on behalf of the New Democratic Party caucus, my leader, and particularly those members from Manitoba, such as the member for Winnipeg—Transcona, who had a very close association with David for many years.

The constituency that I was elected to serve on June 2 is largely David Orlikow territory. I am reminded of that daily by his former constituents.

My personal goal is to achieve David Orlikow's high standards of service and his great fighting spirit. My hope today is to do justice to David Orlikow's memory on behalf of all of his constituents in Winnipeg North who were served so well and so faithfully by David Orlikow throughout his 26 years as a member of Parliament.

It is not an easy task to try to convey in the fullest sense the kind of contribution he made to our party, to his community and to his country; nor is it an easy task to capture the sense of great loss which we all feel at this time.

On behalf of everyone in this House I extend expressions of deep sympathy to his daughter, Leslie, his grandchildren and all members of his family.

Politics and the pursuit of social justice were David Orlikow's life work. He served in public life for 43 years and he served at all levels of government: school trustee, alderperson, member of the Manitoba Legislative Assembly and member of Parliament for Winnipeg North between 1962 and 1988.

David Orlikow died on January 19, a few months short of his 80th birthday, fighting to the very end. He was, as we always knew him, a fighter for social justice, always demanding fair policies when it came to immigration policies, refugee policies, workers rights, always associated with the labour movement and free collective bargaining and a very important part of our party as a founding member of the New Democratic Party and a lifetime member of the CCF and the NDP.

I am sure there is not a person in this Chamber who knew David and worked with him or received one of his many phone calls who did not end up feeling a great sense of admiration and respect for David Orlikow.

We remember David Orlikow for his devotion to the people he was elected to serve, the priority he gave to constituency concerns and problem solving, his determination to achieve fairness one case at a time, his tenacious, unapologetic, no frills approach to getting the job done and his dogged persistence to pursue any injustice or any issue he felt was important. Just look at his record.

I did a quick count of all his House of Commons entries between 1962 and 1988 and came up with a staggering total of 2,906, and he did it all without a lot of fanfare and not much media attention. However, when he did get a headline we knew what David stood for. We knew how he saw his purpose as a member of Parliament. Speaking out against poverty, standing up for equality and fighting the banks, that was David Orlikow. Imagine what he would be saying today about the proposed bank merger.

That fighting spirit came through right to the end. He had conversations with several of us, including the member for Burnaby—Douglas, just days before he died about the need to convince the Canadian government to extend compensation to all the families of the victims of the Allan Institute and the CIA brainwashing experiments.

Today we feel the loss of a great parliamentarian, a social activist, a mentor, a friend and a colleague. Let us honour his memory by recommitting ourselves to achieving David Orlikow's high standards of political representation, public service and human compassion.

[Income Tax Amendments Act, 1997, February 2nd, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, again what we have from the Liberals is a promise to put back into the health care system what they have not yet taken out. They will not deal with the fact that they took the biggest bite out of financing for health care in this country in the history of medicare. They took out $6.8 million which is what has put medicare on such a precarious footing and has opened the door to developments such as what we saw in Alberta with the for profit hospital springing up, with other clinics that are involved in offering services to those patients with the money. That is the kind of situation we have as a result of Liberal policy and this bill does not address the facts.

The member asked a question about what the banks have to do with anything. They have everything to do with finances, with fiscal policy, with income tax. As my colleagues mentioned earlier today, it is precisely that we have a government that expresses outrage at something while it signs an agreement and then uses an excuse—

[Income Tax Amendments Act, 1997, February 2nd, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, this begs a lot of questions about Reform policy when it comes to cash transfer payments from the federal government to the provincial and territorial governments for health, education and social services. Looking at the Reform Party's promise in the last election, it was very clear about yes, spending an extra $4 billion a year on health care but in fact cutting $3.5 billion from welfare spending and therefore only promising to add $500 million to the federal social transfers. In other words it was going to restore about 9% of what the Liberals had cut.

Today we are hearing about its promises to cut either totally or in part equalization payments. We have to look at equalization and transfer payments for health, education and social assistance as a package. We are talking about means by which we try to equalize conditions in this country so that everyone regardless of region, regardless of sex and regardless of income has access to quality health care services, to public education and to assistance in times of need.

We have not heard a peep out of the Reform Party about the fact that the CHST really took 40% out of the transfer payment system which put a lot of people into precarious situations and drove more people into poverty. It is not prepared to stand up and talk about transfer payments as a goal to meet the values of this country which stand for equality, dignity and respect for everyone.

My comment is simply to call on the Reform Party to be up front, honest and open about where it stands on this whole issue of transfer payments and to tell us exactly what it means about a universal health care system. What we have to go on is the Reform Party standing up and opposing any attempt to put in place a universal pension system, any kind of a national income retirement system in this country.

On every front when it comes to those programs which reflect the values of Canadians and which have helped shape this country, the Reform Party has backed off and has in fact played a leading role in eroding those programs. We have no confidence and have seen no evidence from the Reform Party about how it will ensure universal health care in this country.

It needs to start by addressing the question of patent protection for multinational drug companies, something on which we have heard nothing but silence. In fact that goes to the very heart of the matter when it comes to ensuring that medicare is on a strong, stable footing.

What is the Reform position on 22 year patent protection for multinational drug companies? What is the Reform position on the deregulation of the health protection branch? Where is Reform's emphasis in terms of a universal health care system and a government that plays a role in terms of ensuring that people are protected from the vagaries of the marketplace and where government plays a role in terms of equalizing conditions from one end of the country to the other?

[Income Tax Amendments Act, 1997, February 2nd, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I too would like to join members in this House in wishing you a happy new year and to convey my experiences over this past month in my workings in the constituency and hearing the concerns of Canadians.

As my colleagues in the New Democratic Party said earlier today, the experiences we heard about in our constituencies are certainly not in keeping with many of the statements and priorities raised today in this House of Commons.

We are in the middle of a serious discussion of a major piece of legislation, Bill C-28, which deals with many aspects of the realities of people's daily lives. Yet many of the comments and statements today have hardly touched on those realities.

I pointed out before the failure for members on the Liberal side and among the Reformers to seriously deal with the bank issue, to seriously address this monster merger and talk about it in terms of the impact of such a development on the lives of families in our communities. Why the silence or, even more significant, why the support for such a devastating development in our society today?

More specifically, we have just heard a number of responses to a very important part of this bill pertaining to the Canada health and social transfer. I am pleased to have a few moments to address what many would consider to be the most regressive social policy in the history of this country, to talk about a Liberal policy that many in our communities would suggest is more destructive of Canadian unity then any other development we have seen in recent times.

Members of the Liberal Party would suggest that anyone who raises concerns about the Canada health and social transfer are just nay sayers and talking without facts. I would suggest that if members of the Liberal party have trouble hearing the concerns that we raise on this side of the House then perhaps they should listen to the words of reputable members and activists in their midst, people associated with the Liberal party. I suggest they take a very serious look at the speech made recently by Tom Kent entitled medicare, how to keep and improve it, especially for children.

Tom Kent says: “For this medicare we owe no thanks to the present generation of federal politicians. It survives despite them. Though they pose because of its popularity as the defenders of medicare, in fact they have destroyed the financial basis on which their predecessors created it. That political betrayal is the root cause of the tension that, despite the public will, now pervades medicare”.

The bill today or that part of bill today which deals with the Canada health and social transfer allows the Liberal party to live up to its astonishing claim, its astonishing commitment to put back into the health care system what it has not yet taken out. It allows this government to create an illusion of being concerned about health care, standing up for medicare, all the while taking the heart and soul out of this most important national institution.

This is really a bill of tricks to try to convince Canadians that the government is deeply concerned about medicare while cutting deeply into the system and causing the very things it says it is opposed to, privatization, two tier health care, user fees, people's loss of confidence in our health care system. It is this government's policies starting with the CHST that have done more to erode medicare than anything else we have seen in the history of this country.

In the last election we heard from all parties on this issue. The Liberals claim to have seen the light, to recognize the errors of their ways and are investing new money into health care. We saw that promise reconfigured in an announcement last month by the Minister of Health and the Minister of Finance suggesting that this new investment was happening and $1.5 billion, as we heard today from members opposite, was suddenly going to appear on the table and be reinvested in health care.

Let us be clear that is absolute rubbish and nonsense and an absolute misrepresentation of the facts. In no uncertain terms, this government is not putting any new money into health care; it is simply announcing that it will not proceed with the cuts that were going to happen next year.

What kind of hypocrisy is this? How can people have faith in a political system when those kinds of untruths are spread across this country? The fact is this government in 1993 was handed a $19 billion investment in health, post-secondary education and social assistance and proceeded to take $6.8 billion out of the system.

We know what that has done from coast to coast to coast in this country. You cannot just take that kind of money out of the system and pretend that everything is rosy. You cannot now say that you are putting money in that you are not putting in. You cannot do that to the Canadian people.

Let me say while I am on this topic that the Reform Party has no business suggesting it is the defender of medicare by claiming to put $4 billion back into health care. We heard it in the election. What did we hear? The Reform Party was putting an extra $4 billion into health care. What Reformers did not say was that they were planning to cut $3.5 billion from welfare spending. What does that mean? They were planning a $500 million investment in terms of federal social transfers.

Let us put it into today's context. Today they say they are putting $4 billion into health care. In the same speech and in the same breath they are going to eliminate equalization. By today's figures that is $8 billion.

How can Canadians believe that Reformers or Liberals in this House are standing up for medicare when in fact their real agenda is to destroy medicare, to move us to the Americanized model of health care where the rich get access and the poor are denied any hope of quality health care?

The Conservatives started the erosion in the whole transfer system through their series of legislative amendments changing the rate by which money would flow to the provinces so that in fact cash would eventually run out, destroying any hope of enforcing the principles under medicare. What did the Conservatives turn around and promise in 1997? To increase health care spending by 30%. What they failed to mention is they were basically offering to transfer federal taxing power to the provinces—no cash.

That brings us to the current issue today. Never mind that this is not real money we are talking about, the government is suggesting it has put all this money into cash points, missing the whole point that the future of medicare depends on stable, significant, realistic cash funding for health care, without which there is no hope, no possibility of ensuring that all provinces and territories live up to the standards under the Canada Health Act.

In my last minute may I suggest four recommendations to the government that will help us preserve medicare, put medicare on a solid footing so it is there for the youth and the children of this country. Let me suggest first that this government stop its agenda of deregulation and privatization, beginning with its own health protection branch.

Second, try for goodness sake to rethink its position on patent protection. It makes no sense to talk about preserving medicare when it is allowing patent protection for big brand name drug companies to go on for 22 years adding enormous cost to our health care system.

Third, begin to restore the federal cash transfer payments and ensure that money is used to mould and improve our system so that it is truly a community based preventive health care model which will endure for years to come.

Finally, I suggest this government actually look seriously at consulting all these organizations which are deeply concerned about the future of health care and have an open ear and an open mind to some very positive constructive suggestions and start to truly invest in health care. Work with those communities, with the provinces and the territories to ensure that we have a medicare system that is on a sure footing but prepared to take on the challenges of the millennium.