SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 147 - Dec/13/22

Mr. Jagmeet Singh (Burnaby South, NDP)

Dec/13/22 12:02:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am requesting an emergency debate concerning the state of children's hospitals and health care as it relates to children in our country. We have heard the serious news that in Ottawa, the nation's capital, the Red Cross had to be called in to assist at the children's hospital. The Red Cross is called when there is a disaster. In Alberta, trailers have been set up in front of children's hospitals because of the demand and over-crowding in children's hospitals. Children are dying because of respiratory illnesses. We have heard heartbreaking stories from health care professionals about how bad the system is. We need a debate to lay out how serious the crisis is, to hear the stories and the experiences of health care workers and patients, and to chart a course to protect our health care system. We need to keep it publicly administered and ensure that everyone gets the care they need, particularly children, as they are being impacted hard right now. That is why I am requesting an emergency debate in the House today.

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Context: House Hansard - 147 - Dec/13/22

Mr. Mario Simard (Jonquière, BQ)

Dec/13/22 2:42:33 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, enough with the analysis. What we want is results. However, as long as Ottawa is withholding money, there will be no results. The real reason for the impasse is that Ottawa does not want to pay 35% of health costs. Ottawa wants to shatter the provinces' consensus in order to negotiate individual agreements on the cheap and invest as little as possible. While our hospitals are stacking people on stretchers because of a lack of beds, while children are being sent 500 kilometres away for treatment, does my colleague really believe that this is the time to be concocting ways to invest less in health?

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Context: House Hansard - 147 - Dec/13/22

Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

Dec/13/22 6:52:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, first off, I would like to give a shout-out to and acknowledge the health care workers across this country. Nurses, doctors, health care workers and health care professionals are doing such a remarkable job in such difficult circumstances right now with our health care system. As members are well aware, what we have seen is a virtual collapse of the health care system in parts of the country. Over the course of the last few months, we have seen a situation in Ontario where the average wait time in emergency rooms is now 20 hours. That is 20 hours for patients to wait, for seniors to wait, for children to wait. In pediatric hospitals, we are seeing the same incredible length of time for people to get into the hospital. Tragically last weekend, as a family was waiting, a child died in an Ajax area hospital, reportedly because there was no access to emergency support. In Alberta, we have seen a collapse in dozens of Alberta communities. Of course, we can say that the UCP, the Conservative government in Alberta, has an appalling disregard for the health and well-being of Albertans, just as we can blame Doug Ford in Ontario for showing an appalling disregard for the health of Ontario citizens. However, the reality is that the health care system across the country is under intense pressure. The health care professionals I mentioned earlier are the ones struggling to provide services to keep people alive and to provide the kind of medical care that Canadians deserve in this profound deterioration of health care. What are the origins of this? Well, as we saw, the Stephen Harper government basically slashed the accelerator fund for health care in this country. There was hope back in 2015, when the new Liberal government came in, that it would reverse what was effectively a cut to health care funding. However, surprisingly to all of us and in repudiation of the commitments the Prime Minister and Liberal candidates across the country made in the 2015 election, we have not seen the Liberals reverse the Harper cuts to the accelerator clause. Federal funding for health care in this country is at 22%, which means, as a result, that even provinces that are well meaning and want to reinforce the health care system do not have the wherewithal to do that. The NDP has put forward the proposition that we have to provide supports for health care and treat health care as the precious and valued public service that it is. The Liberal government, within four days of COVID hitting, provided an unprecedented $750 billion in liquidity supports to Canada's big banks to maintain their profits. What the NDP members say is that the Liberal government should treat health care with more importance and with a higher priority than it treats the priorities of bank profits in this country. If three-quarters of a trillion dollars can go to bank profits, the federal government has the wherewithal to ensure adequate funding for the health care that Canadians need.

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