44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 18, 2022 10:00AM
Mr. Speaker, I am so glad and grateful to be able to answer this question and to agree with the member that this is a very important bill. We should move forward because, as we all know, the next occasion is going to give us more time and a better place to study the bill clause by clause and to look at it carefully to make sure that it serves the needs of Canadians on dental care and rental support.
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Mr. Speaker, I find it mighty rich that Conservatives are using all of their stalling tactics to prevent children from getting dental care, while MPs in the House get dental care, Conservative MPs.
I find it extremely disturbing and shameful that they are doing this. We need to move forward with this so that children get help so that they can deal with their dental work.
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Mr. Speaker, the member is correct. As we do this, we are going to save probably around $2 billion in emergency services in current dental work not having to be given.
A lot of Canadians, and low-income Canadians in particular, do not have access to dental care because of affordability, and $2 billion in hospitalization costs could be prevented with better dental care for children and low-income families.
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Madam Speaker, I congratulate my colleague for wanting to take a closer look at the bill. That is exactly what we can do if we vote for the motion today. We can go to committee and take the time needed to listen to experts to see how taking care of our children's dental health means taking care of their health in general. It avoids them having to go to the hospital for emergency surgery that would not be needed if they had access to quality preventive dental care. It is for all children who need it in Quebec and elsewhere.
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Madam Speaker, we obviously all feel the urgency of moving forward. December 1 is coming. This is when we would like children of low and middle-income families to benefit from better dental care.
By the way, about a third of all surgeries under anaesthesia for children between the ages of one and five are because children do not have access to proper dental care before they end up in emergency surgery. We know we can do better, and with the assistance of all members of the House, we know we will do better.
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Madam Speaker, the minister knows that Ontario, as an example, has five programs that help low-income children access dental care. Dental care is a program that should fall under a provincial mandate for health.
I am very curious as to why the minister would not have collaborated with the provinces to enhance the programs instead of creating another program, more bureaucracy, more red tape, duplication and triplication of programs. Instead of helping more people in a more streamlined way, the Liberals just seem to be adding more layers of red tape when they could just be helping Canadians.
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for pointing to the need of having more people having access to better dental care in Canada, including through complementing the work provinces and territories currently do. It is only about 4% of total dental care expenses that are currently covered by provinces and territories. About seven million Canadians, 30% of all Canadians, do not go to see a dentist every year, because they do not have the means to do so. Therefore, we need to do better, and we are doing this in collaboration with and in support to provinces and territories.
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Madam Speaker, as my colleague suggests, there are considerable benefits for the provinces and territories in having the Government of Canada invest more in dental health. For example, it costs between $12,000 and $25,000 to treat a child who has a widespread infection because dental health problems were not resolved through preventive services before the child ends up in urgent care, which is very costly for the provinces and territories.
We know that we can do better. We look forward to discussing it in committee to ensure that this bill is as robust as possible.
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Madam Speaker, we should all commend the member for asking for additional time to study this bill. That is exactly what we are going to do at committee, which is where members of the House can spend more time and energy in the appropriate setting, asking for experts and other stakeholders to come to the committee so they can ask questions and get answers.
This is where we want to go next, because, as the member knows, we need more time to take action in delivering dental care and rental supports for low-income and middle-income families.
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Madam Speaker, there are two things: first, the process, and second, the outcomes.
This is the right process to proceed quickly to deliver better dental care for children.
On the outcome, about two million school days are missed by children every year because they need to go for emergency dental care. This is time wasted, obviously, for children. It is also an important burden for families. We need to do better. When children get sick, it is bad for their health and it is also bad for their long-term development, socially and health-wise, especially when they miss days at school.
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Madam Speaker, we know our health care system is fractured. We do not truly have a head-to-toe health care system. It stops here. We know dental care is finally coming in to ensure that people get access to dental care.
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Madam Speaker, we all agree that mental health is health, and mental health care is health care. That is exactly what we should all recognize. We fully support the views of the member that we need to invest more in better health care and better mental health care.
I would like to point out, in addition to what the member said on dental care, that approximately one family out of three in Canada does not have access to dental insurance. That explains, in large part, why many of those families and children do not get appropriate, accessible and affordable dental care.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for allowing this debate.
However, I do question the timing of this announcement, which was made in the middle of Quebec's election campaign, when seniors' groups were making their demands known to the Quebec government.
The government announced dental care funding, but groups like Réseau FADOQ responded that this was not what they were expecting from the federal government. They are asking for health transfers to increase to 35%. Their request was for the government in Quebec.
They understood that. When will the government understand it?
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Madam Speaker, I am certain, because I know the member well, that she also knows what it is like for seniors to take care of their general health, whether we are talking about seniors in long-term care facilities, in residences or every senior who has difficulty affording dignified dental care.
I am sure the member also agrees with everyone in the House that taking care of seniors is also important.
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Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague, because I do not think I have done that yet, on his appointment as my critic. We are going to be working together to support health and the appropriate health care of Canadian citizens.
Let me once again point out that about 4% of total dental care expenditures are currently covered by provinces and territories, and 40% by citizens. Approximately 33% of families with children do not go to see a dentist every year because they are afraid of the cost that it would involve for their families. This is very concerning, obviously, because of the severe impact it has on the mental and physical health of all those children and families.
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Madam Speaker, it is all right for people to not always agree on every bill. It is perfectly fine in a democracy. However, it would be unfortunate if, just because some members in the House do not like or do not approve of a particular bill, the majority of the members of this House could not vote in favour of it and move forward towards delivering the types of services my colleague has already mentioned.
We want to move ahead. I mentioned $2 billion as being the cost of emergency hospital costs because people did not have access to preventive dental care and instead ended up in a hospital for the types of services that would not have been needed had they had access to appropriate affordable dental care.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate joining the debate.
I was a member of the Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan for eight years before I was able to have the honour of this job. We dealt a lot with health and dental care, and I know there are jurisdictions across the country that have dental programs in place for low-income families and for children with disabilities.
Could the minister please outline how many of the provinces asked for this program? I know the health ministers meet at federal-provincial-territorial meetings. How many of the provincial health ministers had this dental program as their top ask or their top priority, consulting within their jurisdictions or with their partners?
I would really like to hear that answer, and I would appreciate it if the minister could talk about the consultations he had with health ministers for this program.
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Madam Speaker, my colleagues are as knowledgeable as we are. The $2 billion I just mentioned earlier are costs that provinces and territories need to pay because of the need to hospitalize people, children in particular, who do not have access to good-quality, preventative dental care. These are big costs that provinces and territories need to incur. More importantly, these are severe health costs that families and children need to bear because they do not have access to affordable quality dental care.
We are working together, complementing each other, supporting their efforts and adding to those efforts the fact that we are going to support about 500,000 children with this particular bill and support families with children and all those who care for those people in the current system.
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Madam Speaker, the underlying premise of Bill C-31 is an assumption that the government is even capable of delivering a $10-billion program, yet its record in government is appalling when we think of the mess it made of passports, when we think of the mess it made of ArriveCAN, when we think of the mess it made with the Canada Infrastructure Bank and even with the delivery of the CERB program.
What makes the minister think that he and his government can actually deliver a $10-billion national dental care program in a coherent and accountable way?
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Madam Speaker, the member is experienced enough to know that this is indeed ambitious, but it is necessary. As we have said, this is going to help about seven million Canadians who currently do not go to see a dentist or dental hygienist because they just cannot afford the dental care they need. What do they do? They wait until their oral health has become very bad, and then they end up in a hospital, with all of the physical, mental and social difficulties that come with ending up in a hospital, as opposed to going and seeing a dentist, with the diagnostics, treatments and preventative services that I think all families and children need in this particular country.
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