- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- NDP
- Courtenay—Alberni
- British Columbia
- Voting Attendance: 67%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $148,159.67
- Government Page
- May/30/24 11:02:08 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I find it pretty rich when Conservatives start talking about expanding pharmacare when they are doing everything they can to block it. Three years ago, they voted against pharmacare. They could have brought forward amendments to expand it to cover people with rare diseases. They did not do that. In fact, they are saying that people are already covered.
Becky in my riding writes, “Our out-of-pocket costs for my son's insulin and devices come to just over $11,000 per year. It is so expensive sometimes that the pharmacy calls me to give me a heads-up about how much an order will be, as if we have an option. Without it, he will die. Something like national pharmacare would be a game-changer for us.”
Maybe my colleague can talk about if she would would be willing to work with the NDP and the Conservatives, with everybody coming together, to include rare diseases. She knows that there is a willing partner right here.
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- May/9/24 12:59:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that member comes from Regina, where there are 66 deaths per 100,000. That is more than 50% higher than British Columbia. Kids are dying from poisoned drugs in his community by accessing unregulated street drugs. In Saskatoon, where brownies are being sold to keep the doors open of safe consumption sites, the deaths are half of what is going on in Regina.
When it comes to youth, it is extremely rare for any young person to be prescribed pharmaceutical alternatives and it is always led by physicians.
To the member's question, young people can access street drugs anywhere, any time. The streets are flooded with drugs. The police have said that safe supply is not what is killing youth. That is not what is getting youth addicted to drugs. Addiction with youth has not gone up since safe supply moved forward. That is a fact; it is published data.
The Conservatives do not believe in peer-reviewed published data. They only support anecdotes. That is what they do. They push it out, and it is harmful and dangerous. It is costing us lives in our country.
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- May/9/24 12:36:12 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour and a privilege to rise today to speak about the leading health crisis, toxic drugs. Certainly in my own province, it is the leading cause of death for those under the age of 59.
This issue is not just close to me; it is close to everyone in my home province, and it is a terrible tragedy. Highly contaminated toxic drugs are raging across the country and killing people every single day. Over 20 people a day are dying. I can tell members personally, coming from Vancouver Island and my hometown, of the impact it has had on everybody in my community. Nobody where I live is untouched. I cannot count on two hands the number of my friends' kids who have died, never mind friends. It is a terrible tragedy that is happening, and we can do better.
We hear this huge debate about harm reduction versus treatment and recovery. However, we have to do both; they go hand in hand. We cannot help people who are dead, as my good friend from Vancouver East constantly reminds me. We need to move forward with policies that are grounded on evidence or evidence-generated and supported policy.
The evidence says that what we are doing is not working. That is the evidence right across this country. We are now dealing with new substances that are highly toxic and addictive. Never before in our history have we seen such challenging times when it comes to dangerous substances. They are obviously lethal, because they are unregulated; they are manufactured, marketed and sold by organized crime.
We have had a number of expert reports on how we should respond to this crisis, including from the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police and the Expert Task Force on Substance Use, which was created by Health Canada to inform politicians on how to move forward in responding to this terrible crisis. All of them are consistent in that we need to stop criminalizing people who use substances, as it causes more harm and is rooted in stigma. We need to create a safer supply of substances to replace the toxic street supply. We need to scale up treatment and recovery; to make sure that we are meeting people where they are, with those systems in place and ready; and to spend money on education and prevention. However, we have not done that, and I say this all the time: The Liberals are taking an incremental approach in a health crisis, which is costing lives. Conservatives are spreading disinformation, which is deadly in a health crisis. We need to move forward and listen to the experts.
I will talk a bit about what is actually happening and the facts about some of the concerns we are hearing from the Conservatives. It is their motion today, and I will speak to them primarily.
The Conservatives have created a moral panic. They are fundraising off the tragedies of families. It is absolutely unbelievable. It is so harmful. If they were truly here to try to help people, they would be bringing forward concrete solutions. However, I have not heard that from any of their speeches today.
I asked the leader of the official opposition why he would not meet with the mothers of the victims of this crisis. I sat with them and listened to them, and their stories are informed. They know better than anyone how toxic the drugs are. They know how hard it is to support someone who is going through difficult challenges when living with a substance use disorder and navigating a system that is completely broken. They know better.
We hear the Conservatives in terms of their moral panic that they have created around this issue. I will talk a little about what is actually going on in western Canada, where we are hearing primarily from Conservative MPs.
Is my home province of British Columbia doing enough? No, it is absolutely not.
Is any province or territory in this country doing enough? No, but they require a federal partner. Vancouver, British Columbia, has been ground zero for over 100 years when it comes to high amounts of substance use. It dates back to the opioid crisis in 1908. This is not new to us in our communities, but what is new is the toxicity of the drugs. It has been challenging because we have been at ground zero facing this terrible tragedy.
When the B.C. Liberals were in government, in 2014, we went from 7.9 deaths per 100,000 people to 30.3 in just a matter of four years, a 383% increase. From 2017, we actually went up from 30.3 per 100,000, peaking at over 47 deaths per 100,000. That is absolutely brutal. After the last 11 or 12 months, we have seen an 11% decline in deaths. That is the trajectory right now for British Columbia. I am not celebrating that, but it is a relief.
This is a tragedy. Every death is preventable. Every single one of these deaths is preventable. We are breathing a sigh of relief that we are heading in the right trajectory, but it needs to go down much faster. We need to come together and work together on that. We went from 7.4 people dying a day in my own province to 6.2. Six families are going to get a call today.
I look at Alberta. The Conservative government got elected in 2019. Alberta had 15 deaths per 100,000 people; now it is at 41 deaths per 100,000. Alberta is leading the country in terms of deaths per capita. Alberta's death rate is skyrocketing. I will give some examples. In Lethbridge, which closed the safe consumption site, the death rate is 137 per 100,000. That is more than triple that of British Columbia. Medicine Hat is at 63.7 deaths, over 50% more than British Columbia. We see reports in the news about Fort McMurray having a record-breaking year. If we do not have safe consumption sites, then guess where people will go to use. They will use in public, in the back alleys and in the bathrooms of businesses, and they die at home, alone. We know that is deadly, when we have a toxic drug problem.
I could speak about Saskatchewan. We constantly hear from members, whether they be the member for Lethbridge or the member for Fort McMurray, pointing a finger at British Columbia. I am not doing that right now. I am just trying to bring some facts so that we can actually have a proper conversation. I will get to that.
In terms of Regina, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle has pointed a finger at British Columbia, instead of coming here to fight to help people in Regina. That is a failure, while people are dying in his community. The death rate in his city is 66 per 100,000. That is straight from the Regina police force.
Those two Conservative provinces are leading the nation in terms of death rates that are skyrocketing. We could look to Alaska, a Republican state, which had a 45% increase last year. There is no harm reduction, no safe supply, no decriminalization in those two provinces and that state. When members want to point fingers at safe supply and decriminalization, what is happening in their provinces, with their one-track, recovery-only model, where they failed to listen to the experts? They talk about wacko. What is wacko is when people ignore experts, ignore evidence, ignore science and ignore the facts. That is wacko.
In the U.S., under Donald Trump, toxic drugs deaths doubled in 30 states, but they want to say it is British Columbia, an NDP thing or a Liberal thing. This is not an NDP, Liberal or Conservative thing. This is a societal issue. The problems and the solutions are not going to be based on ideology. They have to be grounded in evidence and supported by the experts, and led by the experts, not by politicians. I cannot think of another health crisis where politicians are deciding how we move forward.
This is an issue that we know has been chronically underfunded. The Liberals have spent less than 1% responding to the toxic drug crisis. Why? It is because of the stigma. Are the Conservatives helping contribute to the stigma? Absolutely. We need to get away from that harm. We need to make sure that we listen to the experts.
Now, we talk about safer supply. The whole concept of safer supply is that it is to be brought in to replace the toxic drug supply. This is recommended by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police. The law and order party does not want to listen to the police. The police testified at the health committee. They said that 85% of poison drug deaths are from fentanyl. Cocaine was found in the bloodstream. However, they said hydromorphone, safer supply, is not what is killing people. In fact, traces of it showed up in 3% of the analyses of toxic drugs in British Columbia.
Prescribing pharmaceutical alternatives to toxic street drugs separates people from toxic street drugs and helps them stay alive so they can stabilize their lives and connect to treatment and care. There is no way to know the source of drugs purchased on the streets right now, even if a dealer claims it is from the prescribed alternatives program.
The chief coroner of B.C. has indicated that we are not seeing an increase in deaths amongst youth or an increase in diagnosis of opioid use disorder, despite the claims of the Conservatives. The goal of the prescribed alternatives program is to help people at the highest risk of death or harms from the illicit poison drug supply stabilize their lives.
Safer supply has not increased the number of people with opioid disorder. In fact, we have seen reductions in all-cause mortality and overdose mortality; reductions in overdose and in the use of unregulated opioids by those on safer supply; a decline in health care costs and fewer hospital visits; an increased engagement in health care and social services; improvements in physical and mental health; improvements in social well-being and stability; reduced use of toxic drugs from the unregulated street supply; improved control over their drug use; reduced injection; reduced involvement in criminal activities. The diversion of hydromorphone is not contributing to opioid-related mortality. In fact, we heard that for those receiving safer supply through the safer supply program, the risk of dying from any of those causes was reduced by 61%, and the risk of dying from overdose was cut in half. If they received four days or more, their overdose risk was further reduced by 89%.
I want to go back to who is impacted the most. Indigenous peoples are impacted the most. The opioid epidemic and toxic drug crisis are yet another example of the large gaps in health care outcomes between indigenous and non-indigenous people. Indigenous people are disproportionately affected and multiple times more likely to die from toxic drugs. They are seven times more likely to die in Alberta, five times more likely to die in British Columbia, and in some indigenous communities that can skyrocket to as much as 36 times more likely than the general population. We just heard that at the health committee the other day.
I am going to read a quote from Dr. Judith Sayers, the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council president. She sits on the BC First Nations Justice Council. She said:
We want to work with the province in tackling the crisis and be part of a collaborative strategy.... The BCFNJC stands with our partners in healthcare and asserts that the toxic drug crisis needs to be treated and addressed as a public health issue, not a criminal justice issue. The criminal justice system is not the solution to a problem that, instead, needs to be addressed through healing.
We have to stop this colonial approach and listen to indigenous people, who are more likely to die from this crisis.
I have a quote from the police, which, again, the law and order party wants to ignore. The deputy commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said:
As noted, in some of our supervised consumption sites or overdose prevention sites, there are no inhalation rooms or there is no ability to inhale. We find that most of our overdose deaths are related to fentanyl and to inhalation, so we need to provide spaces, I think, that would allow for that, but it can't be a space where someone has to take a bus for four kilometres and go across the city to find that space. Those spaces need to be readily available.
This is against the Lethbridge model.
I will talk about Fiona Wilson, president of the British Columbia Association of Chiefs of Police. She is a deputy chief in the Vancouver Police Department. She said, “85% of overdose deaths are attributable to fentanyl.... [T]hat's what people are dying from according to the coroner's data. They're not dying from diverted safe supply and they're not actually dying from diverted prescription medication”. She also said, “the reality is that there are seven people per day dying in British Columbia as a result of the toxic drug crisis. They are not dying as a result of prescription-diverted medication; they are dying because of the poisonous drug supply that is on our streets.” Lastly, she said, “we do not want to criminalize people by virtue of their personal drug use. Those days are gone. We want to support a health-led approach.... [W]e strongly support the notion of not trying to arrest ourselves out of this crisis. That is not going to save lives. In fact, it does quite a bit of harm”. That is from the police.
I will talk about going to Portugal. I went to Portugal last summer, on my own dime, and I was very fortunate to have the Embassy of Portugal line up a deep-dive itinerary so I could go there and learn.
Why did I choose to go to Portugal? My good colleague from the Bloc talked about Portugal, and I really appreciate his insight. I went there to learn from them. They had a death rate of over 1,000 people in a population of only 10 million, primarily from intravenous drug use. Heroin, as we know, was impacting their community. They had over 100,000 chronic daily heroin users. As my colleague cited, over a million people had tried heroin. They were able to bring their numbers down to 23,000 chronic users. They brought the number of deaths from 1,000 to 60.
I thought it would be prudent for me to go and learn and listen to them. This is how they responded to their health emergency when they decided to treat it as that, instead of a criminal issue. They went from 250 people using methadone to 35,000 in two years. How did they do that? They engaged the military to build labs. They engaged the military to do that so they could reduce the price, get those labs up and running, and save lives. That is how one responds in a health emergency. They built treatment facilities right across the country so that there was no wait, no barrier to treatment, and it was covered under the universal health care system, not like the Alberta model. Good luck getting treatment in Alberta in a short period of time. It is not going to happen.
We heard loud and clear from witnesses, including Petra Schulz from Moms Stop the Harm, who talked about the gaps in the system, and there are gaps in our system.
Portugal also spent a lot of money on recovery, because we know that relapse is part of dealing with recovery. They caught people when they landed. They invested in a four-year follow-up cycle, when people came through treatment. We know that connection is a deep and important part of dealing with the underlying trauma. They made sure that people had housing, and they decriminalized drug use and treated it as a health issue.
One hears my title as the NDP critic for mental health and harm reduction. We do not just see harm reduction as safe consumption sites and safe supply. Those are critical components. However, housing and all the different social determinants of health are also reducing harm. Our goal should be to reduce harm.
We hear the Liberals talk about meeting the moment. They did not respond like Portugal. They have not moved in an expedient way. We need a coordinated, integrated, compassionate approach like that of Portugal.
Portugal created an expert task force. That expert task force morphed into the oversight body for government to move forward. I will tell members why the politicians in Portugal were heroes: They got out of the way. They decided it was a health issue and they let the experts lead. They moved forward with their policy and implemented it. The politicians' role was to make sure that they had the resources to do it. That was the job of the politicians.
We are not doing that today. We need to get to that point, because we know that over 20 people are going to die today. Over 20 moms are going to get a call. It needs to stop. The disinformation, the fundraising, the moral panic need to stop. People need to meet with the moms. The Conservative leader is the only leader who refuses to meet with Moms Stop the Harm. He cannot explain himself. They are informed.
The Liberal government needs to treat this and to meet the moment, like it says. It needs to scale up resources and meet the moment.
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- May/9/24 12:31:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague, who actually stands behind evidence-based policy, policy that is grounded in facts. We hear the Conservatives bring this moral panic around safe supply, for example, and give disinformation about it.
This is harmful in a health crisis. We heard from the president of the BC Association of Chiefs of Police that the diversion of safe supply is nominal at best. She cited that it is actually fentanyl and toxic drugs that are killing people. She was unequivocally clear that pharmaceuticals are a small part of what is being found; actually, hydromorphone is even smaller. It is literally a fraction of what is ending up on the street. People are dying from fentanyl.
Can my colleague speak about the danger of an ideologically driven health policy based on moral panic and disinformation and how harmful that is not just to the victims but to the future of our country and our health care system?
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- May/9/24 11:21:15 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, first, I want to send my condolences to all the families who have been impacted by this terrible, tragic crisis.
We heard earlier about the mothers, and certainly, the mothers know the danger of the toxic drug supply better than anybody. They also have lived experience of what it is like to support someone with substance use challenges. They have insight. They have understanding and knowledge.
We heard from Petra Schulz from Moms Stop the Harm at committee, who comes from Alberta, which now has the highest toxic drug death per capita in the country. They have been requesting a meeting with the leader of the official opposition. They have tried repeatedly. He is the only leader who is not willing to meet with them, to look them in the eye and to listen to them.
Can he please explain to Moms Stop the Harm, the moms across this country, why he refuses to sit down with them?
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- Apr/30/24 12:32:37 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we continue to hear Conservatives rise in the House and tell us that people in British Columbia are covered for diabetes medication.
Becky, from my riding, wrote, “Our out-of-pocket costs for my son's insulin and devices come to just over $11,000 per year. It is so expensive sometimes that the pharmacy calls me to give me a heads-up about how much an order will be, as if we have an option. Without it, he will die. Something like national pharmacare would be a game-changer for us.”
Why are the Conservatives trying to block pharmacare and insulin for Becky and her kid?
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- Apr/16/24 1:32:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we know that the Conservatives have consistently opposed pharmacare. We heard my colleague from Timmins—James Bay highlight that the Conservative deputy leader was a lobbyist for AbbVie, a large pharma company in North America that jacked up its prices on medications for seniors by over 470%. Who really needs pharmacare lobbyists when we have Conservatives here?
I want clarity, because I heard him say, misleading the House, that people in British Columbia are covered for insulin. That is not true.
I am going to give my colleague another chance to clarify that insulin is not free in British Columbia, and in fact, it is a huge cost to many British Columbians, especially working-class British Columbians. Is he going to oppose, for those British Columbians who require insulin, this legislation that would provide them the support they need on life-saving medication, especially when someone loses their job and their deductible is no longer within their affordability level.
I would like some clarification from my colleague from Cariboo—Prince George.
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- May/18/23 10:44:37 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague is worried about vending machines selling safe supply. He should be worried about the unregulated toxic drugs that are being distributed, manufactured and marketed by organized crime on almost every downtown street corner across the country. It can be found on the dark web. It is not safe supply that is killing people; it is fentanyl.
The Canadian Association of Police Chiefs put out a statement. In its report, it endorses access to users of a safe supply of pharmaceutical-grade opioids to combat the uncertain composition of illegal street drugs, which is the cause of many overdoses. It further has made a recommendation in favour of supervised consumption sites, where people can use drugs in a clean, safe environment under the supervision of health professionals trained in emergency intervention.
For my colleague who is a member of a party that says it is the “law-and-order party”, will that party listen to the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs?
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- May/19/22 10:46:19 p.m.
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Mr. Chair, if the provinces and the territories came to the government and asked to procure safer pharmaceutical alternatives to the toxic drugs that are killing Canadians, would it act with the same urgency that it did to procure COVID-19 vaccines and supplies?
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- May/2/22 11:55:44 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, I think that they want us to listen to the experts, and listen to the evidence and the science. Health Canada has created a task force on substance use. It makes clear recommendations that are reflected in my Bill C-216, the health-based approach to the substance use act. They want to see us actually move forward, to look to other models around the world, to have courage and not put votes ahead of people's lives. That is what they want us to hear.
I encourage everybody in the House to talk to Moms Stop The Harm. It is Mental Health Week, which is built around empathy. I ask members to please listen to the moms, the experts and our chief medical health officer, and to talk to law enforcement. They will tell us that by criminalizing people we are just further harming them, and it does not work. It has not worked.
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- May/2/22 11:10:20 p.m.
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- Re: Bill C-8
Madam Speaker, just to follow up, my Conservative colleague talked about inflation that is impacting not just Canada, but countries globally.
One thing we do not talk enough about is the skyrocketing concentration of wealth and the rampant inequality that is growing in our country. We see that we have the lowest corporate tax rate in the G7. We have tax havens that are designed to protect the super wealthy.
Does my colleague agree that we have a big issue when it comes to the concentration of wealth at the top and that the super wealthy could afford to contribute more so that we could build affordable housing, so that we could make sure that people have pharmacare and so that we could tackle the toxic drug supply and the overdose crisis? I appreciate my colleague for always speaking and trying to find solutions.
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