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Don Davies

Member of Parliament
Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians
NDP

Vancouver Kingsway
British Columbia
Voting Attendance: 59%
Expenses Last Quarter: $153,893.57

Government Page

Context: House Hansard - 162 - Feb/16/23

Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP)

Feb/16/23 3:24:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this motion calls on the government to close loopholes in the Canada Health Act. One of the most egregious of these is that while the Canada Health Act prohibits extra billing, which means doctors are banned from charging patients more than the medicare rate for insured services, private clinics get around that by advertising and offering surgery to patients from a different province whom they then charge tens of thousands of dollars. This loophole needs to be closed. Does my hon. colleague think that her government should agree with the NDP that the Canada Health Act must be amended so that provinces can no longer permit the odious practice of allowing the charging of patients for covered insurance services simply by allowing their citizens to cross a provincial border to get that surgery?

135 words

Context: House Hansard - 162 - Feb/16/23

Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP)

Feb/16/23 12:02:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I say this with the greatest of respect, but there is a profound error in my colleague's comment, when he asserts over and over again that health care is a provincial responsibility in jurisdiction only. That is just incorrect. The Supreme Court of Canada said, “'Health' is not a matter which is subject to specific constitutional assignment but instead is an amorphous topic which can be addressed by valid federal or provincial legislation...”. We know there are conditions attached because the Canada Health Act establishes them. When Quebec or any other province gets money, they agree to take that money on the basis of respecting five conditions of the Canada Health Act. Is the Bloc Québécois in favour of two-tier private access to care? He says he is going to vote against our motion. Does that mean the Bloc Québécois is in favour of two-tier private care in our country, because that is what this motion is about today?

174 words

Context: House Hansard - 162 - Feb/16/23

Mr. Don Davies

Feb/16/23 10:32:17 a.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, we absolutely need to open up the Canada Health Act, but we need to do it for the purpose that the NDP is talking about today. This is to close the loopholes that are allowing private, for-profit care to creep into our system. Right now, we have a shortage of doctors in our hospitals. We have a shortage of nurses in this country. Staff are burnt out at every hospital. How can it possibly be a positive development to allow private clinics to drain people from that system and then allow access based on private access to care? We have to add profit and administrative costs to the system. By the way, the United States pays 31¢ out of every dollar to administration. In Canada, we pay under 2%. Administrative costs are much higher in the private system. If we drain those workers, what is going to happen to the wait times in the public system? Obviously, they will get longer. We need to close the loopholes to make it clear that all publicly insured services in this country are delivered in the public health care system. Let us build up our public system. Canadians deserve to have timely access to world-class care. They are not getting it now. New Democrats will continue to make proposals so they can get that.

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Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians

Don Davies