Finance committee  The savings would be tremendous, mostly from the ability to coordinate the bulk buying of medications and negotiate lower costs. I know there's been a lot of focus on the PMPRB and the problems with that. However, some experts we've talked to have said, “Look, if we get a good

Finance committee  It's going to have a huge human impact. I can tell you that we're already getting phone calls at our office from seniors who can't wait for the Canada dental benefit—even the one that was put in place in December—to be applicable to seniors. I just fielded a call today from someb

Finance committee  Thank you. I would like to just add to the comments of my colleague that we hear this all the time from doctors, and particularly nurses. One of the major concerns of our members is the agencies that nurses are moving towards. Quite understandably, they have better working condi

Finance committee  Thank you, sir. We expect it to reflect a commitment to public universal coverage. I'll leave it there. I look forward to your questions.

Finance committee  Thank you very much. Thank you, Chairperson and members of the Standing Committee on Finance. I also want to extend a thank you to everybody who met with our volunteers in March. I know that many of you spent very valuable minutes of your day with our volunteers. It's very much

Finance committee  Thank you for your efforts in getting national standards and dealing with the terrible situation in the long-term care homes. I've read those reports as I'm sure you have. It's hard to read what members of the armed forces were confronted with when they went into those faciliti

Finance committee  I have one suggestion. Enforce the Canada Health Act. We need to give greater priority to the Health Canada strategic policy branch, which is responsible for enforcing, administering and monitoring the performance and adherence to the five principles of the Canada Health Act, and

Finance committee  Thank you for your question, Mr. Boulerice. It's a very interesting agreement. I think we can't understate the importance of the potential of the provisions that are in the confidence and supply agreement between the NDP and the Liberals. Really, we commend the cross-party co-op

Finance committee  Yes, I have some thoughts on that. I want to acknowledge the work that the many organizations in Quebec have done in publicizing the need for a universal program that takes the current system in Quebec and moves it forward into a stronger, more robust program. I also want to ac

Finance committee  Thank you, Chairperson and members of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance. My name is Steven Staples. I am the national director of policy and advocacy for the Canadian Health Coalition. The Canadian Health Coalition was founded in 1979 to defend and expand publ

Finance committee  That's a great question. I haven't looked at that as closely, so I wouldn't want to venture a determination, other than the fact that we all know our health care program makes us really unique. Without our public health care, our medicare program, we're not that different from o

Finance committee  Thank you very much for the question. Absolutely, we are in support of the public dental program that's being proposed. It is definitely an issue that we have long monitored. We have greater expertise on pharmacare, but these are equally parts that were left out of the original

Finance committee  That's a great question, and we certainly do need measurements of performance outcomes. I think those are very important. In fact, some studies by the OECD and so on that I've seen say that there is a discrepancy between the amount of money we spend and the kind of performance we

Finance committee  Thank you very much. I may engage with Mr. Newman, as well, on this. He has more historical knowledge than I do. I would say that, for one thing, the tax transfer system that was employed for health care funding in previous accords did not really yield very much benefit. The fed

Finance committee  Pardon me, but there was no interpretation. Perhaps Mr. Newman can answer for me.