We stand categorically against Bill 60 and the way in which it gives way to corporatize profiteering in our health care system. There is absolutely no room for that. We have been clear. I campaigned as a Liberal in the last election saying that there is room to move some surgeries out of hospitals in a not-for-profit model with adequate guardrails. That remains our position. To be clear, we are entirely against the profiteering and corporatization being proposed under this legislation.

We’ve seen the corrupting effects of profiteering in our health care system. We’ve seen how Bill 124, for example, has pushed nurses out of public health care. Things like temporary, for-profit nursing agencies, which have proliferated under this government, have subsequently pulled nurses out of public health care.

It’s why, in my unwavering commitment to protect our public health care system, I introduced legislation that will hold these nursing agencies to account, that will commit to and strengthen our publicly funded health care system. It’s what I have done as a physician, it is what I am doing as an opposition critic, and it is what I and the rest of the Liberal caucus will always do.

The member across also made the allegation that nothing happened under the previous 15 years of Liberal government. I would point out that the most immediate five years of performance under this Conservative government have been the worst years in this province’s entire history. I would caution the member about any sort of chest-thumping, given the current state of our health care system.

On repeated occasions, the Minister of Health has been very clear that she didn’t believe that there was a problem in the first place. I recall quite vividly that she cited a 1-800 number, I believe, to anyone who believes that they have been upsold and upcharged, in frank contradiction to what the Auditor General has been telling us.

And so, amidst that backdrop, amidst this problem that we know is objectively a problem, this government now expects us to believe that, coming out of that fantasy land, they can be trusted to protect against upcharging and upselling with this new fallacy of a plan? It simply is not credible.

Thank you for your question.

Report continues in volume B.