Preston Manning

[Health Care, April 28th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question.

I thank the minister for her reply. However it does not take a brain surgeon to figure out what is at the root of the financing problems of health care. The total health care bill in Canada is now over $70 billion with the provinces paying 46 per cent of that bill, individuals and private insurance companies paying about 28 per cent and the federal government now paying about 23 per cent. The federal government is no longer the senior partner in health care financing. It has become a junior partner.

Will the minister today admit that health care transfers are now insufficient to permit the provinces to meet the demands of the Canada Health Act? Will she commit to amend the act to give the provinces the flexibility they need to finance the major portion of the bill?

[Health Care, April 28th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, my question today is for the Minister of Health. Yesterday the Prime Minister acknowledged that there are serious problems in Canada's health care system, but in the same breath he refused to consider the most obvious measures to help our health care system to survive.

My question for the health minister is this. If the federal government cannot maintain its financial support of health care, and if it will not amend the Canada Health Act to allow the provinces more flexibility in paying for health care, how then does the minister propose to solve the problem of financing health care in Canada?

[Health Care, April 28th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, since you permitted a quotation from Shakespeare I am sure you would permit one from Edmund Burke that says: "Just because a few grasshoppers under a fern make the field ring with their importunate chirping, whilst thousands of great cattle repose beneath the trees chew their cud and are silent, please do not believe that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field".

[Health Care, April 27th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is avoiding the issue. When national medicare was introduced the federal government made a solemn commitment to carry 50 per cent of the cost to the provinces.

Today federal transfers in support of health care in provinces like British Columbia cover only 36 per cent of the cost. Yet the federal government continues to use the Canada Health Act to tell the province how to finance and operate the system. In other words, health care is being choked between reduced federal transfers and an outdated national health care act.

My question to the Prime Minister is very simple. Will he stop the choking? Will he promise that federal transfers in support of health care will be maintained and instruct the health minister to give the provinces more latitude, not less, in developing solutions to their health care needs?

[Health Care, April 27th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the root of the financial difficulties of health care lies in the fact that federal transfers to the provinces in support of health care have consistently declined over the last 15 years. Just last week the finance minister promised further cuts to federal transfers.

If the Prime Minister is really committed to health care, will he commit today to maintaining federal transfers to health care at present levels and to making deeper spending cuts elsewhere required to support that commitment?

[Health Care, April 27th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.

Recently the Minister of Human Resources Development was forced to cancel a federal-provincial meeting on job training because several of the provinces objected to the federal government's approach.

Now it appears the Minister of Health may scuttle the planned forum on national health care with her ill-advised tax on provincial health care initiatives in Alberta and British Colum-

bia. National health care reform requires more co-operation, not less, between federal and provincial governments.

Will the Prime Minister instruct his Minister of Health to stop antagonizing and start listening to the provinces on health care reform?

[The Economy, April 26th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, we are getting question period reversed here. We will be happy to answer the questions.

In seriousness, the Prime Minister did not answer my simple and direct question. I will repeat it. All we are looking for is a straight answer. Could the Prime Minister assure members of the House that if they were to reduce the spending estimates presented to them in committee the government would accept those reductions and not regard them as an expression of non-confidence in the government's budget?

I ask this not just on behalf of committee members on this side of the House but on behalf of members on all sides of the House.

[The Economy, April 26th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Prime Minister for his answer. He may be a bit behind in his reading. We tabled in the House a list of $20 billion in spending cuts that could be made over the next three years. Those were our contributions to the solution to that problem.

My supplementary line of inquiry is that one positive signal that the Prime Minister could send to the money markets would be to openly encourage parliamentary committees to reduce rather than simply rubber stamp the spending estimates presented to them.

Could the Prime Minister assure members of the House that if they were to reduce the spending estimates presented to them in committee, the government would accept those reductions and not regard them as an expression of non-confidence in the government's budget?

[The Economy, April 26th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.

Both the International Monetary Fund and Moody's Investors Service have again expressed concern about overspending by the Canadian government. It is not just the size of the deficit and the debt that worries the money markets. It is also their concern that the federal government seems to lack the ability or the tools to control overspending.

What plans, if any, does the government have to strengthen the capacities of the Treasury Board, of departmental managers, of Parliament itself to control federal overspending?

[Federalism, April 20th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the Deputy Prime Minister's answer. However what is missing from it is any deep commitment or acknowledgement of the need for real reform of federalism itself.

If it can be demonstrated to the government that a majority of Quebecers want a balanced federal budget, that a majority of Quebecers want an overhaul of federal language legislation, that a majority of Quebecers want systemic change, like many other federalists in the country do, would that persuade the government to offer Quebecers and indeed all Canadians something more than status quo federalism?