44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 14, 2022 11:00AM
Madam Speaker, when the will and support are there from the chamber, we can very easily get things passed such as important legislation. I think of legislation that we passed late last year, and here we have before us legislation that would enact literally hundreds of millions of dollars toward rapid testing. There is absolutely no doubt that this is important legislation, given the very nature of the debates we have been witnessing, especially last week's concurrence report that was brought up to prevent some debate from taking place.
Does the minister not agree, given the very nature of the importance of rapid testing and that provinces, territories and stakeholders are calling for more rapid tests, that Ottawa has to step up to the plate and provide these badly needed tests, especially when we think of our small businesses, individuals and people who are in such high need today? We have witnessed that in particular over the last two and a half months.
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Madam Speaker, I wonder if the Minister of Health could provide those following the debate with an explanation of what the federal government's role is, with respect to rapid tests. I think it is an excellent example of a team Canada approach where provinces, territories and communities are working with Ottawa to ensure that rapid testing is done.
Could the minister just go over the process of why the federal government is the governing body that is actually buying and procuring these rapid tests?
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- Feb/14/22 11:34:14 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, we request a recorded vote.
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Madam Speaker, it is no surprise the Bloc raises the issue of health care transfers. However, there is a fundamental disagreement I have with my friends in the Bloc, which is that the constituents I represent, and I would argue they are very much reflective of Canadians from coast to coast to coast, feel that the national government does have a very important role to play in health care. It would be highly irresponsible, I would argue, to do nothing but just hand money over.
There are things that we can learn through this pandemic, such as with the long-term care facilities and the need for national standards. There are other issues of mental health and so many other aspects. Would the member not recognize that there are many people across Canada, including in the province of Quebec, who do want to see the national government play more of a role than just giving cash?
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Madam Speaker, I truly recognize and appreciate the role the New Democrats are playing on this very important initiative. In fact, they have been very creative in ensuring there is that much more accountability.
I am wondering if the member can provide her thoughts. Being from the same province, we understand how important the demand is, particularly in late December and early January, because of the variation in the coronavirus and the impact it was having in the province of Manitoba.
How important is it that we pass the legislation to ensure we have the funding for rapid tests?
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Madam Speaker, we are entering into a process today that will ultimately see a very important piece of the government's legislative agenda pass.
To start off, I just want to acknowledge that the opposition parties have a choice. To some degree, I am very pleased with my New Democratic friends. People who have listened to me articulate in the past will know I am often offside with my New Democratic friends. Having said that, I appreciate the approach the NDP is taking on the process we are entering into today, which would ensure that Canadians feel comfortable in knowing that the federal government would be passing legislation that would assist in ensuring there would be rapid tests from coast to coast to coast. It is something that is absolutely urgent. We have at least one opposition party that has recognized that.
On the other hand, even though the Bloc party is somewhat sympathetic to the need for rapid testing, and I guess that is something to appreciate, it wants to tie it into health care transfers. I would suggest that is for another day's debate. I would suggest that the Bloc is not too late to look at the urgency that is required.
I will expand on why it is so important that we see that sense of co-operation shortly. Before I do that, I want to reflect on the Conservative approach to this particular piece of legislation.
The Conservatives have demonstrated one thing very clearly over the last number of months, and that is that they are all over the map. We have no idea where they might be on any given issue, at any given point in time. In fact, if we were listening to one of the Conservative members who spoke today, we would think that the Conservative Party does not believe that rapid testing is an effective tool. I, and many members present inside the chamber, really question how the Conservative Party would not understand and appreciate the science, and listen—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
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Madam Speaker, I would even extend that 10 minutes with leave, if they want.
At the end of the day, the science and health care experts in all regions of our country have recognized the value of rapid tests. There was a day when the Conservatives actually did support rapid tests. They talked about how important it was for Ottawa to get rapid tests, and Ottawa acquired, through procurement, tens of millions of rapid tests. In fact, at the end of or mid-December of last year, six, seven or eight weeks ago, there was a surplus of rapid tests in Canada. Millions and millions of rapid tests were not being utilized.
We have often talked about COVID-19 being something we cannot just mandate away. When a new variant of the coronavirus comes, hospitals are once again inundated. Provinces, territories and others recognized that we needed to implement rapid tests in a more effective way, so the demand for rapid tests exploded in the month of December. We provided the storage of rapid tests in good part to meet the immediate demand that occurred in December. Then, through our procurements, in January we brought forward an incredible effort that saw over 140 million additional rapid tests. We can take that in the perspective of Canada's population of thirty-seven and a half million people.
The Government of Canada understands the science behind rapid tests, and I think rapid testing is a good tool. It is not quite equal to the vaccinations, but I would like to emphasize just how important it has been from the beginning of the pandemic that we have seen provinces, territories, indigenous leaders and stakeholders working in a team Canada approach to deal with the pandemic.
We saw that in the distribution of vaccinations. Canada today is leading the world in vaccination and getting its population vaccinated, and that is no accident. That is because we have had effective leadership, whether it is from Ottawa, the provinces and territories, indigenous leaders or others. We are also seeing today, again, an excellent example through rapid testing.
At least the government and two opposition parties recognize not only that rapid testing is important, but that the federal government has a role to play in it. The NDP members want to see the legislation passed because they know, as we know, how critically important it is to get over $2 billion to finalize purchasing and ensure that Canadians have these rapid tests. This is while the Conservatives dither. The official opposition does not really know what to think about rapid tests.
I would encourage people to read some of the comments on the record by the first speaker from the Conservative Party, who I understand sits on the standing health committee representing the Conservative Party.
An hon. member: Oh, oh!
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- Feb/14/22 1:56:47 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to—
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Madam Speaker, I would just suggest that I should get a bonus two minutes because the member interrupted my speech.
At the end of the day I really believe that if members look at the legislative agenda that the Government of Canada has put on the table over the last couple of months, they will see that there is a very strong focus on the issue of the coronavirus and bringing in legislation to support Canadians in every way.
The very first piece of legislation we brought forward was Bill C-2, which dealt with issues such as the lockdown benefits, wage subsidy benefits, rent supplements and other supports for Canadians. Members will recall that the Conservatives back then attempted to divide the bill. They were already trying to slow down the legislation. Without the support that was provided from that legislation, there would have been a great deal more hardship over Christmas and going into the new year, as a direct result of Conservative negligence and not understanding what was important.
With respect to the motion we are debating today to put into process an amount of time to ensure that this bill passes, one only needs to look at the behaviour of the official opposition members to understand why it is so important that we put in a closure motion on the legislation. If we are not prepared to do that, we will see an ongoing display of the games, whether it is what was demonstrated with Bill C-2 or, as members will recall, last week's concurrence motion. There is a finite amount of time in the House of Commons. That is one of the reasons that, in order to be able to provide the support that Canadians need, we have to bring in this motion. We want to continue to have the backs of Canadians.
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- Feb/14/22 3:34:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand at this time.
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Mr. Speaker, as I said to my colleague, I do value those 20 seconds.
When it comes to legislation, when we listen to members of the opposition and different political parties, they will often talk about the time allocation that allows for debate, and understandably so. I did that when I was on the opposition side as I now today do it from the government side.
There are certain legislative initiatives that are actually processed via time where, for example, the opposition will move a motion on the floor of the House and at the end of the day a vote is requested on it, or they can go into private members' hour where they get a very limited amount of time on private members' business. However, it also happens at times for government business through unanimous consent.
Just recently, back in December, we can recall when conversion therapy legislation came before the House. It was so encouraging when members on all sides of the House said this was an important issue that was important to Canadians. The House, without any debate whatsoever, agreed to pass it through second reading and committee, the whole nine yards, and it was done unanimously when all it took was one member to say no to it.
In respect of other types of priorities in the past number of years, and particularly as a minority government, Canadians want us to and we want to work with opposition parties. Sometimes it has been the Conservatives, sometimes the Bloc, sometimes the New Democrats and at times it is even getting support from the Green Party representatives. It varies, depending on the legislation.
Like the conversation therapy legislation, the issue we are debating today is of the utmost importance. If we reflect on what this bill would enable, every member of the House will vote in favour of the legislation. The issue is when they want to have that vote.
We have critical supports for the coronavirus pandemic that still need to get through the House. This is yet another piece of legislation. Timing does matter. This is going to be a very busy week. We are looking to see if there are other partners with whom we can get the support to recognize the importance of the issue and, ultimately, to get the legislation passed.
Those people who are following the debate might ask why we do not allow for additional debate. Much like in the past, when other parties have recognized the importance of an issue, they will ask for unanimous consent to get that legislation through. Here we have an important piece of legislation that the Government of Canada wants to get through and has recognized as being important. If there were discussions in good faith that said we could get this thing through today because there is no other mechanism to guarantee its passage, I suspect we would have been open to that. However, we have to move this as well as other pieces of legislation. I am talking about the GIS legislation that is quickly coming before the House. We have to get this stuff through. We have identified it as a priority.
I am grateful that the New Democratic Party has also recognized the value of getting this thing passed quickly. At least the Bloc members are kind of halfway. They recognize the importance of rapid testing, but they do not necessarily want to support its going through as quickly as we would like to see it go through. As I said just before question period, I hope that members of the Bloc will rethink that.
Just because the Conservatives banter and cheer and do all sorts of weird things at times does not mean we have to follow their lead. There is an opportunity here to show what many members of the opposition were calling for not that long ago during question period, which is to show some leadership in recognizing just how critically important this legislation is to all Canadians.
From the very beginning of the pandemic, we have asked Canadians to step up. We all have a role to play. We worked with different levels of government to ensure that support programs were in place so that businesses would be in a better position to continue on and the number of job losses would be minimized. We brought in programs to support incomes for those Canadians who were unable to be in the workforce for a wide variety of reasons, as well as a multitude of direct supports to seniors, people with disabilities and non-profit organizations. We all came together to get us through the pandemic. Securing vaccines and vaccinating people has enabled us to be in the position we are today, with a great deal of hope and light.
The rapid tests are a critical part of our recovery, of getting out and beyond. We know that for a fact, because that is what the science and health care professionals are telling us, not only with respect to the federal government and the people we rely on, but also the provinces.
If we flash back to November of last year, there were tens of millions of surplus rapid tests in storage waiting to be used. There was no pent-up demand; there was a pent-up supply ready to be used. Once we experienced the omicron variant of the coronavirus, the numbers started to shoot up rapidly, and those rapid tests became absolutely essential. We stepped up, as we have done for Canadians since the very beginning. Tens of millions of tests that Ottawa was able to acquire were distributed. For the month of January alone, we had well over 100 million additional rapid tests. I would challenge any member of the opposition to tell me of a country in the world that has acquired more in one month, on a per capita basis, than Canada for distribution to its population. I do not believe we would be able to find such a member or country. It is possible I could be wrong, but I say that because I know how much this issue has been on the minds of the Minister of Procurement, cabinet as a whole and many other members inside this House. We saw the benefits. We realized how important these rapid tests are.
This legislation is absolutely critical to moving forward. If we did not bring the closure motion and do not pass this legislation, it would bring into jeopardy all sorts of things, either directly or indirectly, such as the legislation dealing with the GIS, not to mention anything else that might be coming up, including being able to support opposition days, such as I believe the Bloc has coming up on Thursday, or dealing with the short days on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Today is the day for us to have this debate, because this is legislation that is necessary in order for us to continue the fight against the coronavirus. I would like to see the Conservative Party be consistent, recognize the science, support the health care professionals, get behind the legislation, get behind the motion and recognize the importance of passing it here today.
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Mr. Speaker, the issue is on the support for rapid tests from science and health care experts. The member should read what his colleague said earlier today, when he put into question whether we should even be listening to science and health care experts. He should review the comments from the Conservative member. They surprised a lot of us.
I have a deep amount of respect for the colleague who posed the question. He knows and is fully aware that in any given week, it could be a very tight agenda. For example, today is all about the rapid tests. We also have to deal with legislation in regard to the GIS. We also have an opposition day motion. Those are the three big days. Then Wednesday and Friday are short days. If we were to take the approach the Conservatives want us to take, we would be putting into jeopardy the passage of legislation that is needed today. I would encourage my friend to revisit the sense of urgency if in fact they support the need for rapid tests.
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Mr. Speaker, the vote that we just had prior to getting under way with this particular motion is something I am more than happy to discuss offline with the member.
What we are talking about today, the motion that I am debating, is a motion that would see closure put in for Bill C-10, which deals with the rapid tests, in the hope that the Bloc party would not only support the need for rapid tests but would support the urgency in getting the legislation passed. That is going to be the vote that we are going to have later today.
Does the Bloc actually support the sense of urgency in getting Bill C-10 passed? I think the people of Quebec and the people of Canada are watching and want to see how the Bloc is going to respond.
I will answer the second part of his question in a follow-up.
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Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to speak in the House a number of times and often referred to the fact that in the last couple of years during the pandemic, we saw the creation of a multitude of programs and supports. To say they were absolutely perfect would be misleading on my part, so I will not mislead.
Yes, we brought forward a suite of programs, and there has been the need at times to modify them. They were modified because we understood, after listening to Canadians, that we needed to make some adjustments. The Minister of Seniors just referred to one during question period in wanting to co-operate and provide additional funds for issues such as mental health and long-term care facilities. The list goes on in terms of the types of supports and investments we have made in health care over the last couple of years.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to be kind. After all, the member for Cumberland—Colchester is a medical doctor, and we love our health care professionals for the fabulous work they have done throughout the pandemic.
That said, members on the government side or any Canadian cannot blame the Conservatives for giving different positions on the same issue at times. They have not been consistent. The quote that my colleague and friend just referred to highlights one inconsistency on a very important issue.
Science and health care experts are what we have been following and listening to since the beginning. The same cannot be said about the Conservative opposition party. Today some were questioning it. As the member pointed out, one was not only a medical doctor but also someone who sits on the health committee representing the Conservative Party. I do not get that.
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Mr. Speaker, I do not know the package and I am not a doctor myself. At the end of the day, I am following the best advice that is provided to me. I would tell the Conservative caucus to feel comfortable in knowing that a vast majority of people recognize the science and the health care experts. Rapid tests are a good thing and we need to have them in our tool belt.
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Mr. Speaker, the first Conservative speaker today talked about the science of rapid tests, and in his comments he implied that we need to have a study on the effectiveness of rapid tests. Given that the member who just spoke is the opposition House leader, I am wondering if he can expand on what the Conservative Party truly believes with respect to the effectiveness of rapid tests. Does the Conservative Party believe that they are, as science and health care experts say, the type of tool we must have? If so, would he indicate that there is no need to call into question the effectiveness of this particular tool?
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Madam Speaker, we will have to agree to disagree with the Bloc on the whole issue of health payments. I believe the federal government contributes its fair share, and we continue to contribute in different ways.
Having said that, I am glad Bloc members seem to want to support the bill, but along with their friends in the Conservative Party, they are not recognizing the sense of urgency for the legislation. In the past, the Bloc would have recognized the urgency given the very nature of rapid tests. Why would the Bloc not support the importance of getting this bill through in a timely fashion by supporting the closure aspect of the motion today?
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Mr. Speaker, I must say that was entertaining. When we follow the debate of the Conservatives today, we have to wonder where they are on the issue of tests.
We have some members who stand up to ridicule it. It is almost as if they do not believe rapid tests play a valuable role at all in society. They are asking why we are spending this money. Then there are other members who stand up to say they are going to vote in favour of the legislation.
I guess the question to ask the member is whether he will be be voting in favour of the legislation. Is he against the legislation? Where is the Conservative Party today, Mr. Trump? Oh, I meant that for the member.
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Mr. Speaker, I withdraw the comment and I apologize.
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