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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 21

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 1, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 21 - Feb/1/22
Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)
  • Feb/1/22 10:46:35 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to see you again. You are just as radiant in 2022 as you were in 2021. I just want to tell my colleague that the oddest thing I saw in the throne speech was the creation of a department of mental health. That is just as odd as establishing a department of national defence in Quebec City. Health is a provincial jurisdiction. If my colleague wants to address the health file, I could discuss the fiscal imbalance with him. Year after year, Ottawa generally has more money than expenditures; it is the opposite for the provinces. What I would advise my colleague to do is review all requests from all the provinces to increase the health transfers up to the much talked-about 35% threshold, a tidy sum of $28 billion that would bring transfers to $60 billion a year. Is my colleague aware of that?
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Context: House Hansard - 21 - Feb/1/22
Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)
  • Feb/1/22 12:19:43 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I was listening carefully to my colleague and, in the introduction to his speech, he talked about divisions in Canada. I agree with him that in a pandemic, what we probably need to avoid most are divisions. He referred to many things, such as the rapid tests that have been slow in coming. I have a simple question for my colleague. In the last few days, they have seemed to offer tacit support to the protesters that we see outside. The question that springs to mind is this: Does he think that horns are more effective than vaccines at getting us through the pandemic?
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Context: House Hansard - 21 - Feb/1/22
Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)
  • Feb/1/22 2:59:52 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the debate in the House and I find myself wondering if I am in a bad dream. Omicron is overwhelming our hospitals. Health care workers in Quebec are exhausted, and 63 Quebeckers died from COVID‑19 today, but no one is talking about funding for health care. No one is talking about how our health care system is in urgent need of reinforcements even though we all know that reinforcements have been needed since the beginning of the fifth wave. When will the federal government understand that it needs to increase health transfers?
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Context: House Hansard - 21 - Feb/1/22
Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)
  • Feb/1/22 3:00:57 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the elephant in the room is the fact that the federal government has not taken action. Ninety per cent of Quebeckers are vaccinated, and yet they have been locked down again since Christmas. Why is that? It is because the health care system is fragile. This government has consistently refused to increase health transfers to 35%. What will it take for the government to see that the way out of this crisis is health care funding? In Quebec, when we think “lack of funding”, we think “lockdown”. What does the minister have to say to that?
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