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Feb/8/22 8:34:54 p.m.
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Madam Chair, this is one tool in the tool kit, and really it is the only tool that both levels of government have been using. Although it has been useful for many people and has saved lives, as we know, it is simply one tool. There are so many other tools we are not using. When we look at the numbers that I cited in my speech, we can see how the numbers are increasing. It is not solving all of the issues. It is just one tool. We need to be looking at all other options out there in order to best help and resolve the situation.

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Mr. Denis Trudel (Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, BQ)

Feb/8/22 8:35:47 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I am pleased to participate in this evening's debate. My colleague is right. We are currently in the midst of a terrible crisis. However, I do not agree with her that it is a federal responsibility. The opioid crisis is a mental health issue. Mental health to me means health, and health is a provincial jurisdiction. Every day, young people, people on the streets of Longueuil, would like to see psychologists, but they cannot because psychologists are underfunded and there are none. Does my colleague agree that health transfers should be increased? That would make it possible to increase mental health services for those who want them, to provide better working conditions for nurses, to foster hiring, and to provide support for people struggling with addiction. Health transfers must be increased. That is an inescapable fact. Ottawa has the money, and health is a provincial jurisdiction. The federal government must transfer the money.

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

Feb/8/22 8:36:45 p.m.
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Madam Chair, again, we have to utilize all the tools that are available. They are provided through funding, and the federal government can be a leader on that. It is one of the reasons that, on this side of the House, we have been asking to increase the health transfers to the provinces. That is just one of our tools, and then the provinces can utilize it the best they can. We also have to look at national strategies that can be implemented across the country so there is some consistency as we go from province to province.

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Mr. Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, NDP)

Feb/8/22 8:37:34 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I think we all know in the House that prohibition did not work to reduce alcohol use and the war on drugs has not worked to reduce drug use. It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. That is just common sense, because to address a problem, one has to correctly identify the cause of it. Experts in addiction tell us that the cause of drug use and addiction is pain and trauma. Therefore, arresting, jailing, criminalizing and adding pain and trauma to drug users will never work, and it has not. Does the member think that criminalizing drug users and forcing them to purchase poisoned drugs from street dealers is something this Parliament and her party should continue to allow to happen in Canada?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

Feb/8/22 8:38:28 p.m.
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Madam Chair, if we want to back this up and look at the causes, let us talk about the drug dealers who are out there. Right now, we have legislation before the House that looks at reducing sentences for drug dealers for smuggling. If we are going to back this up and look at some of the causes, let us start where people are getting some of these very harmful drugs, and let us address it there as we are going through all these other steps.

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Mr. Nathaniel Erskine-Smith (Beaches—East York, Lib.)

Feb/8/22 8:39:08 p.m.
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Madam Chair, at the outset, I will be sharing my time with the member for Vancouver Centre. I also want to thank the member for Yukon for ensuring that this take-note debate happened. I very much appreciate his advocacy and the health-focused advocacy that he has. The sheer scale of this crisis is hard to fathom. We have lost 25,000 Canadians since the beginning of 2016. Every one of those has a personal story, of course, impacting many more family, friends, co-workers, loved ones and others, but it is not just opioid-related deaths. We should describe this problem as what it is: It is a poisoned drug crisis. I think a recent report from Public Health Ontario and the Ontario Drug Policy Research Network described it accurately as an opioid toxicity crisis, and we should all describe it in this way. We know the laws on the books are ineffective. The police chiefs have told us the laws are ineffective, but it is worse than that. The laws actually contribute to these deaths because they push people away from treatment. We know that on the evidence. They stigmatize people and they push people away from treatment. What is worse, prohibition is the absence of regulation. When it is left to the black market, what we get is poisoned drugs and those poisoned drugs are killing people. It is prohibition that is killing people. We know that it is getting worse, of course, in this pandemic. It was bad before the pandemic, but it is getting worse. What is the answer? I have heard colleagues say they do not know the exact right approach. I have heard the Prime Minister say that decriminalization is not a silver bullet, and it is not. We absolutely need to do everything we can to stop the scale of death. Let us listen to the experts. There was a recent substance use task force that included a police presence, that included a presence from mental health experts, and that included a range of different voices. Do members know what they called for? They called for bold action for decriminalization, and for a regulatory approach. Let us talk about regulating a safer supply and expanding that safer supply. Do members know what the answer to a poisoned drug crisis is? It is ensuring that the drugs are not poisoned. It is as simple as that to save lives today. Decriminalization is not a silver bullet, but do members know what it does? It ensures that we treat drug use as a health issue, and that we encourage people to seek treatment. I worry when the Portugal conversation comes up. By the way, Portugal still was probably more coercive than I would like, but if anyone wants to get up and support the Portugal approach, we should do that immediately because it would save lives. It not only removes the stigma and encourages people to seek treatment, but in Portugal they also wildly expanded treatment. That is also what we have to do, but not in steps when so many people are dying. We do it all at once. If we want to talk about Portugal, I would push back a little bit on my Conservative colleagues. I would say that Portugal decriminalized and rapidly expanded treatment at the same time because it was facing a crisis. Do members know what we need to do? At the same time, we need to rapidly expand treatment options. There was $500 million promised in a platform that builds up $150 million from a previous Parliament. We need to deliver that money in the budget to make sure there is evidence-based treatment. That should go hand in hand with removing ineffective criminal laws, and those are not my words but the words of police chiefs, that push people away from the very treatment we want to provide. We need a safer supply, because a poisoned drug crisis is killing people. Members should not listen to me. They should listen to CAMH. Listen to the police chiefs. Listen to the experts on the substance use task force. Listen to every single expert who has looked at this issue with any seriousness to say what we are doing is killing people. Let us do something differently and, yes, let us do it all at once. This level of a crisis demands that we do everything we can, all at once, to save lives.

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Mr. Taylor Bachrach (Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP)

Feb/8/22 8:43:30 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-216

Madam Chair, my colleague for Beaches—East York had powerful remarks. I have been deeply moved by the stories that the constituents of northwest B.C. have shared with me: heartbreaking stories about the loss of their loved ones, and particularly stories from parents who have lost their children. They plead with me to do something immediately in the House. I heard that urgency in my colleague's remarks. My colleague, the member for Courtenay—Alberni, has brought forward a bill that will come forward very soon in this Parliament for debate. It represents some of the very solutions that my colleague has outlined in his remarks. My question to him is this, because I cannot imagine that he would not support my colleague's bill. What will he do to work with us to build unity in the House and pass this bill immediately, or as soon as possible?

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Mr. Nathaniel Erskine-Smith

Feb/8/22 8:44:34 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-216

Madam Chair, I have jointly seconded that bill. I will happily support that bill. I will support any legislation that moves us closer to a safer supply and that moves us closer to an evidence-based approach that treats drug use as the health issue that it is. We do not treat gambling addiction with the criminal law. We do not treat alcohol addiction with the criminal law. However, we think this is different: It is an illicit substance, which is only illicit, by the way, because of past racist policies directed at particular communities if we track the history back in this country. We treat different levels of addiction very differently. I am happy to support that bill, but fundamentally we need the government to put more dollars on the table, and we need provinces to take those dollars and to follow the evidence.

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Mr. John Barlow (Foothills, CPC)

Feb/8/22 8:45:23 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I want to thank my colleague. As I have said, we have had lots of discussions about this, and I certainly appreciate his passion. However, many of the members in the House continue to mislead a bit on the comments by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, when they talk about their support for decriminalization. The one key to their statement was that they would support decriminalization if police officers across the country had the resources to divert those who needed it into sufficient treatment and recovery, which does not exist right now. Would my colleague not agree that it is critical, if we are going to go down this road, for the chiefs of police and police forces across Canada to ensure that proper treatment and recovery beds are in place first if we are going to divert people into those programs?

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Mr. Nathaniel Erskine-Smith

Feb/8/22 8:46:06 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-5

Madam Chair, I will say two things. I worked closely with the president of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, Bryan Larkin, to ensure that a bill I introduced in the House had their support. By the way, that bill is now part of Bill C-5, and that bill has their support. Regardless of new spending, that bill will have the support of the chiefs of police, and I hope it has the support of my Conservative colleagues. It is my genuine hope that we rally across parties in the House and we do the right thing. Of course we need more money to expand treatment options. I would say I actually do not want police to be the first responders for what is fundamentally a mental health crisis in an individual's life. I do not think that is the appropriate response. I think Portugal is probably too coercive, and Bill C-5 is probably too coercive in that way. We should get police focusing on criminals, not focusing on people suffering from mental health problems. Ideally, that is the answer. To the member's point, we absolutely need much more significant funding to expand treatment options. That is an area I think we could work together on.

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Mrs. Julie Vignola (Beauport—Limoilou, BQ)

Feb/8/22 8:47:09 p.m.
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Madam Chair, all evening, we have heard horror stories, but we have also heard some potential solutions. As my colleague was saying, we also need funding, beds and resources. Education is important for stakeholders and for families, starting in early childhood. This will require an enormous amount of time, money and commitment. The topic we are debating tonight is unfortunately one that comes up often. Where is the commitment? When will the government turn words into real action?

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Mr. Nathaniel Erskine-Smith

Feb/8/22 8:48:06 p.m.
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Madam Chair, far be it from me to commend the government for certain actions, but I will say that, on this particular crisis, we have seen significant action since 2015. We have seen an expansion of supervised consumption sites. We know that those save lives. We have seen hundreds of millions of dollars in funding, including to expand treatment options. We have seen the restoration of harm reduction as a central pillar of our drug strategy. My criticism is different. It is not to say we are not taking action. Certainly we are taking much more significant action than past governments in this country, but there is the scale of the crisis: the number of people who are losing their lives. These are preventable deaths. If we change our policies, these are preventable deaths. The government is acting, but is the government acting quickly enough, proportionate to the scale of the crisis? That is where the criticism lies.

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Hon. Hedy Fry (Vancouver Centre, Lib.)

Feb/8/22 8:48:58 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I am so excited to participate in this debate. I think my colleague just said it all. We talk about a crisis. A crisis sounds like something existential. This is real. In my province of British Columbia, 6.5 people a day are dying from preventable deaths. This is a mental health issue. This is a mental health problem, and there is a way to deal with it. We can talk about decriminalization, and we can talk about a whole lot of other things. The only thing that would stop people dying from a toxic, illicit supply of illegal drugs is a safe supply of drugs. That is it. That is simple. Since 2015, we have heard from my colleague that our government has done a great number of things. We have expanded safe consumption sites, and we have been able to allow everyone to have naloxone readily available to them, for if they have an overdose. However, we have also learned some other things. Things have changed since this began. Now, 70% of street users inhale opioids. They are not using them intravenously any more. They are inhaling them. We need to deal with that. We are finding out that about 35% of people who are dying from an overdose are dying in private homes. About 50% are dying in social housing, in hotels and everywhere else. Only a small percentage of people are dying on the street. This mythical figure we have of some homeless person lying in the gutter using opioids is not true. Clear evidence tell us opioids are being used by professionals, families, people with children and middle-class persons. It is killing them. We need to stop it. I think our government has done a great deal. We have brought in naloxone, as I said. We have been able to increase the number of safe consumption sites, and we have been helping with field operations to deliver harm reduction in cities across the country. We have been doing all of this, but the number of people dying each day is increasing. I wanted to point out that, no matter what we have to say about safe consumption sites, in the most recent report from British Columbia there were no overdose deaths in safe consumption sites. Of these deaths, 55% were in hotels and single-room occupancy housing and social housing, and 35% were in private homes. Let us get this picture right. The majority of people who are dying from overdoses are men under the age of 39. These are people in the prime of their lives: productive Canadians whose lives have been lost. We have it in our power to prevent this, and what we need to do is go with a safe supply. We need to look at how we provide the right kind of safe supply, though. Right now, in Vancouver and in other places across the country, you can get intravenous drugs given to you in small clinics that do not reach everybody. However, if people are inhaling the drugs, we need to be able to look at using a drug that has been used for 25 years in Europe. It is called diacetylmorphine, or DAM. DAM has been used with success. People who are taking it are beginning to live productive lives. They are going to work, they are having families and they are doing normal things because they do not have to worry about dying. I think the most important question to ask is how do we get diacetylmorphine into the hands of the people in Canada who need it? One of the big things we found out is that the provinces are unwilling to do this. They are afraid. The political risk for them is too high, so we talk about decriminalization as if it is a magic bullet. It has nothing to do with anything. What I would like to suggest is that the federal government has it in its power to use the substance use and addictions program to deliver small amounts of money to pilot projects, driven by clinical practitioners in their practices, by physicians and nurse practitioners through telehealth, and by other ways of getting inhalable diacetylmorphine into the hands of people. It is simple. It is an easy thing to do, it is clinically proven and it is evidence-based. The outcomes are great in Europe, where they call it heroin-assisted treatment. Let us stop having ideology about this and stop moralizing about this. Let us save lives, people. We have it in our power to do so. If we allow for SUAP to be given to the clinicians and nurse practitioners who want to use it through telehealth and other ways of getting this out to real people, then we can save those lives.

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Ms. Laurel Collins (Victoria, NDP)

Feb/8/22 8:54:18 p.m.
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Madam Chair, the toxic drug supply is taking lives. There has been a lot of talk tonight about the Portugal model. It has decriminalized the use of all drugs and unleashed a major public health campaign to tackle substance abuse, investing significantly in treatment and recovery. Crucially it decriminalized and, ever since, drug addiction in Portugal has been treated as a health issue and a social justice issue, not a criminal justice one. I know the member of Parliament for Beaches—East York supports decriminalization. He just gave a scathing indictment of his government's lack of action on this issue. The member for Vancouver Centre just said that decriminalization has nothing to do with it. Experts disagree and the science disagrees. The member says that provinces are too scared to act, but her own province, my province, is asking the federal government for an exemption so that we can have a safe supply. When Dr. Bonnie Henry, the public health official, is advocating for decriminalization, when chiefs of police are advocating for it, how can she say this has nothing to do with it?

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Hon. Hedy Fry

Feb/8/22 8:55:33 p.m.
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Madam Chair, decriminalization does have something to do with it. It removes the stigma. We are already moving forward with that as a federal government. We have asked attorneys general, federal and in every province, not to give criminal records to people who are using certain amounts. The City of Vancouver is willing to work on this. I am in support of it, but the thing that saves lives, which is what I am focusing on tonight, is safe supply. When we look at the evidence, yes, Portugal has had some success, but the greatest successes are occurring in Switzerland and the Scandinavian countries where they are using safe supply. We need to recognize how people use it. It is not being used intravenously anymore. It is being inhaled. We see all kinds of people using it. We need to move forward to save lives. Decriminalizing is important. It is one of the many tools that we have, but everyone is focusing on that and nobody is really talking about access to safe supply. The federal government has been giving access to safe supply and funding safe supply in every province that has asked for it. The thing we are talking about is how to make this inhalable drug available to 70% of users and how to ensure that we are using a tried and true for the past 25 years drug that has been shown not only to save lives but to get people into rehabilitation—

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The Assistant Deputy Chair

Feb/8/22 8:56:55 p.m.
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I have to give other members an opportunity to ask questions. The hon. member for Edmonton—Wetaskiwin.

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Hon. Mike Lake (Edmonton—Wetaskiwin, CPC)

Feb/8/22 8:57:03 p.m.
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Madam Chair, we are having yet another debate on this issue, saying some important things with lots of great sentiment. The member has been a member of Parliament for a long time and was a minister at one point in time. One would think she would have influence within her own party, especially with her credentials. I am wondering what specific action her government has taken that she can point to and what demonstrable results those actions have resulted in to tackle the opioid crisis. The numbers do not seem to indicate any action or impact whatsoever.

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Hon. Hedy Fry

Feb/8/22 8:58:00 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I will start by saying that we actually opened up safe injection sites, safe consumption sites, across this country, which were blocked and stopped for 10 years by the Conservative government. That is the first thing we did. Second, we made naloxone available, which can immediately save someone who is dying of an overdose and prevent them from dying. We have been giving access to drugs to many provinces that have been able to accept it. The problem is that it is not reaching everyone. I talk all the time with colleagues of mine who are also physicians. They are telling me that the thing to do is to use what has been successful for 25 years in Europe, in Switzerland and Scandinavia, which is diacetylmorphine. It is an easy drug. I have told my colleagues in government, because we recently found out this is something that is easily done, to provide a substance use and addiction funding program to doctors, nurse practitioners and others to give this drug, in its inhalable form and its intravenous form, to people who need it. The SUAP grant funding will make it happen because right now in the province of British Columbia, it is not being allowed by the provincial government. My friends may say—

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The Assistant Deputy Chair

Feb/8/22 8:59:23 p.m.
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We have to resume debate. The hon. member for Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon.

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Mr. Brad Vis (Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, CPC)

Feb/8/22 8:59:33 p.m.
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Madam Chair, let me begin by saying this is one of the most informed, incredible debates I have seen in the House of Commons since I was elected. I am going to be splitting my time with the member for Peterborough—Kawartha. A lot of the statistics I wanted to raise and some of the points I wanted to raise have been shared already. I have been focused recently on the Parliamentary Budget Officer when he said that we spent over $300 billion on COVID-19 measures since 2019 alone. Looking beneath our ongoing public health debates is what we are discussing here tonight and that is the opioid crisis, which is particularly bad in my home province of British Columbia. I had this internal debate a few times throughout the last two years. Imagine if we spent just a fraction of what we were putting into COVID-19 to keep people home and directed those funds to some of the treatment options that have been shared here tonight. For the purposes of expediency, let me raise a couple of points on first nations. A 2017 report by the First Nations Health Authority and B.C. Coroners Service found that status first nations were five times more likely to experience an overdose and three times more likely to die from one. Some people within first nation communities are continuing to use opioids even after receiving life-saving treatments three to five times through Naloxone. This is devastating. Another area that requires some attention and it was raised by the last speaker from Vancouver Centre is about men. Men are disproportionately impacted in their thirties by this devastation in the opioid crisis, particularly, in the B.C. construction industry. This is one of the largest employers in my province and anyone who has ever worked in construction knows that it is hard physical work and workers often suffer a higher rate of injury on the job. As has also been discussed tonight, in this male-dominated industry, workers are statistically less likely to discuss mental health and substance abuse problems due to stigma. The impact of stigma on drug use is real. Fear of stigma prevents some people from seeking help. Labels like “drug abuse” or “drug abuser” dehumanize how people are suffering and can impact the quality of care they might consider accessing. That is an important point to raise. We really need to look through the lens of the 30-year old male who seems to be disproportionately impacted by this and indigenous people. For the purpose of time, I called up a friend of mine, Jesse, who works for the 5 and 2 Ministries in Abbotsford. They get lots of contracts with the Province of B.C. and the City of Abbotsford to deal with issues like the opioid crisis. It is important to mention in the context of treatment that we need to find hope. Based on what an expert told me today, people are going to recover and get past this, despite the debate about safe supply and everything else, if people have hope and they have something to live for. That needs to be part of any conversation we have today. My community of Abbotsford and my entire riding of Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon have seen the devastation first-hand. My office is directly beside Haven in the Hollow. I just had a report that there was a death there the other day. There were also 19 Naloxone treatments in one month. In conclusion, I am going to propose and throw out some new policy ideas that might help and add to the discussion tonight. First, we need to do more to empower civil society. Imagine if we gave tax breaks to Canadians who want to support a treatment centre, similar to what we give those who support political entities in this country. Second, in British Columbia we have talked a lot about the other side of drugs and that is money laundering. FINTRAC, the ability of the RCMP to stop the people importing illicit drugs into Canada, that is not taking place. That is one area where the Liberal government has not taken action to address the real and dangerous consequences of money laundering. Third, we need to give more control to first nations to address this issue as well. We need to give them more control over housing and we need to apply culturally appropriate methods to address the opioid crisis.

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