SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 200 - May/18/23

Ms. Julie Dabrusin (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources and to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Lib.)

May/18/23 1:28:23 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, one of thing I have been having trouble with in the debate today is that there are certain elements of an entire spectrum of care required for the opioid crisis, but one is being pulled out as if it is the only one being proposed by the government, which is not true. Also, the experience in my community seems to be very different from what I hear from the members opposite. In 2022 in Toronto, 1,900 overdoses were reversed because of safe consumption sites. They actually saved the lives of almost 2,000 people in my home city. There is a safe consumption site in my own community, and our experience with it is that it has provided a place of safety to people in need. We are not seeing the same impacts being described. Does the member opposite not see any value in saving lives, as I have said are being saved in Toronto, and in ensuring we provide an entire continuum of services?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

May/18/23 1:29:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, what we are talking about today is safe supply. As I spoke about in my intervention, in British Columbia we have been seeing what is playing out on our streets between safe supply and decriminalization. Mayors from all over the province have come forward to put together bylaws in order to attempt to make their cities more safe. People are afraid to take their kids to parks and playgrounds. That is what is actually playing out on the streets. As I was mentioning, we are seeing people taking that safe supply and selling it out on the streets. It is creating this whole black market where people are taking that money and buying more dangerous drugs, like fentanyl. It is perpetuating a more difficult situation, and the numbers are increasing. The facts are what they are.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

May/18/23 1:30:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge the presence of students from Rivière-des-Quinze school, who have come all the way from Témiscamingue. I would like to acknowledge the presence of the mayor—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

May/18/23 1:30:51 p.m.
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I would remind the hon. member that one must not draw attention to people present in the House.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire

May/18/23 1:30:58 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I never imagined I would see people like the mayor of Latulipe‑et‑Gaboury here among us. They came here to learn. Now, to get back to the opioid crisis debate, I had a chance to talk with these students. We were wondering about a question that I would now like to ask my colleague who was with me yesterday at the entrepreneur caucus meeting. I know she has a special interest in many issues related to personal development. Could we take action in the areas of education and guidance? In relation to the housing crisis, could we address the opioid crisis more effectively if we were able to provide more accommodation?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

May/18/23 1:31:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as I mentioned at the very outset of my speech, people are in a really desperate space. It is leading to this addiction and mental health crisis. People cannot afford to live. They cannot afford to feed themselves. They cannot afford medicines. The price of everything is going up. Inflation is affecting people's everyday lives. I hear about this in my riding. People cannot even afford their rent or mortgage. Everything has doubled. Rents and mortgages have doubled. People are getting into a very desperate space. This is fuelling the addiction and mental health crisis. We need to deal with the economic side, while we also deal with this very serious addiction issue.

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Ms. Lori Idlout (Nunavut, NDP)

May/18/23 1:32:42 p.m.
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Uqaqtittiji, from my understanding, medical practitioners, the Canadian Chiefs of Police and other experts support safe supply. Could the member tell the House who the Conservatives are hearing from who do not support safe supply, which we know is a vitally important life-saving service for Canadians?

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Mrs. Tracy Gray

May/18/23 1:33:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have people reaching out to me all the time, people who have boots on the ground and are seeing the results of this. They reviving people who are taking safe supply over and over again. There is a lot written about this. I know people can be selective in what they are reading. I mentioned one of the articles about safe supply in my intervention. There are many articles about this. My time is up, but I have—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

May/18/23 1:33:46 p.m.
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Not only is the member's time up, but we cannot use props. Resuming debate, the hon. member for Cariboo—Prince George.

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Mr. Todd Doherty (Cariboo—Prince George, CPC)

May/18/23 1:33:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have to take a breath and calm down a bit. This debate is a powder keg. People on all sides of the House have incredible feelings toward this. Our colleague from the Bloc, the member for Beauport—Limoilou, spoke passionately about this. Our colleague from Saskatchewan spoke passionately this. My colleague for Kelowna—Lake Country spoke passionately about this. We all know someone, perhaps very close to us, who has been impacted by this. However, it is very clear that what is taking place today is not working. It is broken. After eight years of trial and error, the record shows that the government has broken the system, and that should not surprise us. Everything the Prime Minister touches breaks. What he does is divide Canadians. Why does he divide Canadians on issues, whether it is vaccines, or the opioid crisis or other things? Because if we are fighting among each other, we are not focused on his blunders. It is dodge and deflect. Here are the facts. Since 2016, over 35,000 Canadians have lost their lives because of the opioid crisis. In a crisis of incomprehensible scale, the death toll due to illicit drug overdoses rose 300% in my province of British Columbia during the first three months of 2023. That is 596 lives lost in just three months of this year. That is 596 sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers. Their dreams and hopes are lost. As parliamentarians, we have failed them. Canadians are suffering, Canadians are dying, and we have done nothing. What is the real issue we are talking about today? It is the opioid crisis, the fentanyl crisis. This drug seemingly floods through our borders, and we are powerless to stop it. I have stood in the House so many times over the last seven and a half years to talk about the opioid crisis, a crisis that at least on this side of the House all across the way we can agree is a national crisis, but the government fails to declare it so. Why are we so angry and frustrated? Because the Liberals like to conflate things. We are talking about safe supply. What are they talking about? They are talking about supervised consumption sites. It is so frustrating. The Liberals made promises on the mental health side of things before getting elected in 2021. They were going to pledge $4.6 billion in a mental health transfer to provinces to help combat mental health and addiction. What happens when they get into government? They renege on that and rethink their promise. This is impacting real people. In a period of great economic uncertainty, the Prime Minister is spending hundreds of millions of dollars giving out free drugs. Since 2017, the federal government has spent over $800 million on its failed Canadian drugs and substances strategy, including $100 million in funding for hard-drug supply projects across Canada and an additional $74 million to scale-up these projects over the next five years. That is nearly $1 billion spent on this pilot project. However, what has this emphasis on safe supply achieved? There are 20 opioid deaths in Canada a day; a 173% increase from where the opioid epidemic began in 2016. Where is the investment on recovery? The Minister of Mental Health and Addictions has placed that financial burden purely on the provinces and territories. She said earlier today in her speech that they hope that the provinces will see their way to support recovery and create those beds. They hope. There are no new treatment centres or beds. While somebody who is addicted to drugs is waiting up to a year or more, they can go to a vending unit and get the drugs that they want. Let us talk about vending units for a second. During the gun debate, the Liberals would have members believe that, through the Conservatives' reckless gun laws and policies, people could go to a vending unit and get guns and ammo. Those are pretty simple terms. That is exactly what this Prime Minister tells Canadians and tells the world. In fact, the Liberals have created a system where pop-up booths in my province are selling crack, cocaine and other drugs on the street. Health Canada approved an organization to produce and distribute cocaine. That is true. Not only that, but vending units are popping up all across our province where people who are struggling with addictions can go and plunk in their coins and get drugs. However, the drugs they are getting are not strong enough for them, so they peel off the labels and sell the drugs so they can get the money to buy the harder drug that they want, fentanyl. Fentanyl is 50 to 100 times stronger than morphine. A dose the size of a grain of sand can kill 1,000 people. It is flooding our streets and it is killing our sons, daughters, fathers and mothers and we are doing nothing about it. Why are we frustrated? I heard the Bloc members speak about a dogmatic approach and make comments like that. This is a non-partisan issue for me, but I get frustrated when all we do is stand up here and we pour our hearts out. We want to do better for Canadians. I have talked about our legacy in mental health and addictions time and again in this House. What do members want their legacy to be when they leave this House? I know I want my legacy to be that I made a difference each and every day in the mental health and well-being of Canadians and that I have used my time here so that we can save lives. I believe hope is always possible. I believe recovery is possible. I do not believe in giving up on someone by just handing them another drug. The Liberals are saying “Are we not keeping them alive?” We are perpetuating their addiction. My brother was shot twice in June 2021 with a shotgun. We would think that would knock him straight, but that addiction is so strong. Two days later, he was back on the streets. My brother-in-law was killed by an overdose. A player I coached, Chad Staley from the Prince George Spruce Kings, got his tooth knocked out in a hockey game. One of his co-players thought he was giving him oxycodone to help with the pain. Chad was at home with his family, took this pill and was dead within an hour. That is why we are angry. We are doing nothing. We will bring hope to these families. We will bring our families home, safe, sound and healthy.

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

May/18/23 1:43:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker. It is a bit odd, because at one point my colleague said that this is really a non-partisan issue, yet he spent 10 minutes criticizing the Liberals, the Bloc Québécois and the NDP. I agree that it is somewhat partisan, but it is primarily a public health issue. At least, that is the Bloc's take on this. Addiction is a mental health and public health issue. As soon as we talk about health care, we are talking about funding for the health care system. The federal government may not pay doctors, train nurses or run hospitals, but it has the means to help the provincial health care systems deal with crises like the opioid crisis we are experiencing right now. I have never really heard the Conservatives take a position on health care funding or on the provinces' demands for health transfers. I would like to hear what my colleague has to say about that.

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Mr. Todd Doherty

May/18/23 1:44:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague obviously has selective hearing. I talked about this being non-partisan and then I took offence to the dogmatic comments that we heard from the Bloc. I did talk about the promise from the Liberals prior to the election for a $4.6-billion mental health funding transfer that they forgot about once they became government. This is about doing the right thing for Canadians. I have said so many times that there are so many tools in the tool box, but it does not work if only one part of it is done. Providing and perpetuating addictions is not helping without any avenue for recovery. There has to always be that avenue for recovery, and we are not seeing it. Jurisdictions that people talk about are Portland, Seattle and Portugal. Portugal did not have a fentanyl or opioid crisis when it launched its decriminalization. Portland and Seattle are failing because they did exactly what Canada did; they did nothing. They put no services in place for recovery, and that is the honest to goodness truth.

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Hon. Carolyn Bennett (Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health, Lib.)

May/18/23 1:46:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the member, as always, for his very poignant explanation of the importance of this mental health crisis in Canada. There is no disagreement that there need to be four pillars of a drug policy, including treatment. I was wondering if the member would help us as we develop the bilateral agreements with the provinces and territories, the $25 billion that will be there. For that third pillar on mental health and substance use, other than just wait times on mental health needs, are there other indicators that the member thinks would be helpful, like treatment beds or adequate aftercare, the kinds of complex care for people who we know have serious mental illness and substance use? What would be some of the indicators the member thinks should be in the action plans of the provinces and territories so we can work through all orders of government to address this crisis?

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Mr. Todd Doherty

May/18/23 1:47:12 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague talks about indicators. Indicators involve two different things. Indicators are what is working and what is not working, but there are measures we can take that will help. Let us put dollars and cents into recovery, making sure beds are available when they are needed, whenever they are needed. Let us make sure that we have trained professionals available at all times. If it is the first point of contact with primary care physicians, we should make sure they have a team approach. If somebody is facing a mental health issue, whether it is suicide prevention, mental illness or addictions issues, there should be someone there so that primary care physicians are not getting burned out. That is a team approach. The minister knows this. We have talked about this specifically. I differ with my hon. colleague, which she knows because we have had great discussions on this, because I think we should be spending more money on recovery rather than just safe supply. Perpetuating addiction does nothing. It may keep somebody alive today, but what about the next day or the next day? We have to get these people into recovery.

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Ms. Lori Idlout (Nunavut, NDP)

May/18/23 1:48:35 p.m.
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Uqaqtittiji, I know the member genuinely cares. I wonder whether the member agrees that we need to have better services for indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples are overrepresented in the opioid crisis. Does he agree that we need to have better healing and reconciliation programs to help uplift indigenous peoples so that too many of them are not entering this crisis?

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Mr. Todd Doherty

May/18/23 1:49:23 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the feelings are likewise. I truly appreciate when the member for Nunavut stands up and represents her community. In our previous election, our platform talked about culturally based treatment programs working within our indigenous communities, funding beds and treatment centres within those communities that were culturally related, and working with indigenous leaders and elders to make sure that we are doing this where it is needed and helping those who are less fortunate.

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Mr. Brendan Hanley (Yukon, Lib.)

May/18/23 1:50:01 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-216

Madam Speaker, I am splitting my time with the member for Richmond Centre. I am pleased to speak in the House once again on the opioid epidemic in Canada, an issue that has long been close to me personally both as a northern public health physician and as Yukon's former chief medical officer of health. I always appreciate the opportunity to bring the issue to Parliament, so I appreciate the efforts of the official opposition, although I cannot agree with the motion itself at hand. It is blatantly ignoring the recommendations made by health and social service professionals, law enforcement leaders and both national and international best practices. I know how busy the hon. Leader of the Opposition has been of late and perhaps the hon. leader has not found the time in his schedule to review the most up-to-date data on best practices to respond to the opioid crisis. We know he has had trouble with scheduling of late, but I am happy to take some time to give him a bit more information on the subject matter. Let us start with the beginning of this motion. Yes, Canada, we are in the midst of a devastating toxic drug crisis and one that hits my territory of the Yukon particularly hard. In Yukon we are struggling with the highest per capita rate of toxic drug-related deaths in Canada. While the loss of any life is keenly felt around them in smaller and remote communities, when not only one person but sometimes two or more are succumbing at once, it hits all of us in a way that is difficult to describe. Yukon's chief coroner reported 25 deaths last year attributed to toxic substances. On a per capita basis, this is worse than B.C. About two-thirds identified as first nations, so they are greatly overrepresented in these tragic figures. Our government did introduce a substance use and addiction strategy in 2017 and we have invested heavily in it, including in harm reduction, which was excluded in the drug strategy of the previous Conservative government, in which the hon. member served as a minister. The approach our government has taken to the crisis is much more comprehensive and multi-faceted than simply handing out legal drugs. The approach has been to support all pillars of the response: prevention; harm reduction, including safe supply; treatment; and enforcement. A multiplex approach like this is far more effective at saving lives than simply locking up people up. Treatment is one important part of the solution but not the entire solution. While a comprehensive approach includes harm reduction, including safe supply, it also focuses on education, access to life-saving treatments such as naloxone, and reducing stigma. It is connected to investments made in culturally appropriate treatment and prevention programs across multiple government departments, including working with public safety to ensure border services and law enforcement to identify and detect toxic drugs illegally before they get onto our streets. Is it enough? No, clearly not, not while we continue to lose 20 Canadians per day from toxic drug overdoses. Let me be clear. Canadians are dying from a market awash in illegal drugs. Safe supply is not causing deaths. Safe supply is part of a life-saving treatment. Data from coroners in both B.C. and Ontario have found no link between prescribed hydromorphone and drug-related overdose deaths. The opposition leader's story on a link appears to be entirely speculative and we know that this speculative tendency is often within his purview. What safe supply, as one of the many responses to the crisis, achieves is for those people who use, diverting use of the drugs from the unregulated street supply and thereby reducing overdose risk. What else is achieved? Here are many benefits, according to a recent review: improved control for that person over drug use so that they can control their dosing, avoid withdrawal symptoms and manage pain; lower costs for health care; better engagement in retention and health care programs and housing; improved physical and mental health; fewer emergency department visits and hospitalizations; decrease in infections and complications; improvements in social well-being and, guess what, decline in health care costs. It all works, but we need to scale up the efforts along with all of the other pillars to match the scale of this epidemic. During this debate and others, there is also far too little consideration of the urgency that we need to apply to prevention. What does that mean? That means equipping our children, our youth, our citizens to avoid dangerous, risk-taking and addictive behaviours, not by saying no to drugs but by starting life with quality early child care and parental support; avenues for organized physical activity and recreations throughout life; cultural connection and mental support at all transition points in life. In this vein, our government's investment in quality early learning and child care is transformational and, when combined with other aspects of prevention, will have an enduring impact. Now some words about decriminalization. I was proud last year to support the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni's Bill C-216, which called for a national drug strategy and called for Canada to move toward decriminalization. That bill did not pass, but I still support its intent. The other day, the hon. Leader of the Opposition referenced the Portuguese model quite favourably, and he is quite right. Portugal's drug-related deaths have been below the EU average since 2001, and there are many other markers of success. It is a model, but its success hinges upon the decriminalization of simple possession of drugs, non-mandatory access to treatment and harm reduction. I am wondering if the Leader of the Opposition endorses, through his fondness for the Portuguese model, its central tenets of decriminalization of personal possession and substance use; harm reduction, including opioid substitution; and needle exchanges. I would suggest that the answer is no. Decriminalization is another one of those concepts that members of the opposition want to weaponize and use to make it seem like those who support decriminalization want to let criminals run amok, but that simplistic reasoning is not the case. Portugal pursued decriminalization in the early 2000s. Illegal drugs in Portugal are still confiscated, and possession still results in penalties such as fines, community services or recommended intervention, but penalties for simple possession are redirected from the criminal justice system to district-level panels to determine the best course forward for the individuals. There are 30 countries around the world that have adopted aspects of decriminalization, including Australia and Chile, in addition to Portugal. Public health experts have long called for fundamentally changing our approach from the criminal justice approach. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police noted in 2020 that evidence from around the world suggests that our current criminal justice approach to substance use could be enhanced using health care diversion approaches proven to be effective. I wonder if the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police are among the hon. Leader of the Opposition's “pie-in-the-sky theorists” or purveyors of the “misery industry”. I think parents, children and first responders who have witnessed loved ones and patients die of toxic drugs before their eyes might have another opinion. I know there are Conservative Canadians who do get it. For example, I refer my colleagues to the fact check Ben Perrin has been doing on the Leader of the Opposition's motion this morning. Mr. Perrin is a lawyer and a UBC law professor who was an adviser on justice-related issues to former prime minister Harper. Over the past number of years, he has written extensively about why and how his position on decriminalization has changed. As Perrin notes, in a 2022 article in the Calgary Herald, “There isn’t any evidence to back Kenney and [the Leader of the Opposition]'s 'war on drugs' policies. Their ideologically driven crusade is cruel, costly, ineffective and deadly.” Under a system of decriminalization, those who are using can get help, and under safe supply, drug users are at least using substances less likely to lead to death. This also offers a chance for intervention when they are ready and better health outcomes. Let us not go back to the 1980s and the days of “just say no”, which sounds so simple and tempting. The war on drugs, a gauntlet which, with this motion, the Leader of the Opposition wants to take up again, has long been lost, and we need to look at evidence, not emotion and rhetoric, to address it. Some months ago, in the health committee, I brought forward a motion to study the opioid epidemic in Canada, specifically responses to it including B.C.'s trial focused on decriminalization. I hope to see the study move forward in the fall. Perhaps bringing together some of the evidence in one place will help adjust the hearts and minds of those across the aisle on this issue. The hon. members opposite know that they are misleading Canadians by trying to connect the government's policies to the toxic drug crisis. This approach is frankly shameful. I suggest that, in the interest of defending the lives and families of Canadians, the opposition party seriously reconsider its ill-founded approach. As devastating as the toxic drug crisis is, there is another issue at play here and that is the dismissing of evidence and scientific analysis when the evidence is not convenient. Our job as politicians is to make decisions based on what the evidence, and its ever-evolving journey, is telling us and to adapt our decisions when the evidence changes. If we are changing science on a political whim, then we are heading into a dangerous world. We have seen the shuttering of science under a previous Conservative regime. Especially in an age when false information is so cheap, we must not let that happen again.

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Mr. Stephen Ellis (Cumberland—Colchester, CPC)

May/18/23 1:59:31 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that, once again, our colleagues across the aisle are trying to make this a crazy partisan issue with their inflammatory language. This study is actually what the member is quoting from. This is very different from the $3.5 million that the Liberal government has spent on dispensing machines for hydromorphone, three in Vancouver and one in Victoria. I wonder if the member has a comment because the paper that he is quoting from talks about comprehensive social services, medical care, housing supports and social supports. It is interesting because, on this side of the House, that is what we are talking about. On that side of the House, they are talking about giving away drugs to people without any accountability. People can use fake names. What does the member have to say about that?

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Mr. Brendan Hanley

May/18/23 2:00:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my friend and medical colleague from across the aisle and I can agree on the need for a comprehensive approach, which I spoke to in my speech. Harm reduction, including safe supply, is one of the pillars of that approach. We need to support and scale up safe supply to use it when it is indicated. That is part of the overall approach.

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Mr. Adam van Koeverden (Milton, Lib.)

May/18/23 2:01:06 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is shameful how misinformation is being peddled by the leader of the Conservative Party. Last week, when the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development spoke of the horrible wildfires in Alberta, the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, the member of Parliament for Carleton, yelled across the aisle, “Started by your government”. The former leader of the Conservative Party of Canada said not that long ago that it seemed as though of his party had gone a little too far down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theories during the pandemic, referring to comments by some of MPs as being not helpful and spreading a lot of uncertainty. Sadly, it seems that the member for Carleton is doing the same thing. He is spreading distrust and fact-free conspiracy rhetoric with respect to the deadly opioid epidemic. This week, when the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions, a physician, was standing up for science and an evidence-based approach to saving lives with harm reduction, supervised consumption and safe supply, the leader of the Conservative Party aggressively repeated that she was killing people. This is to a doctor who has taken the Hippocratic oath. It is beyond the pale. Canadians deserve honest representation and leadership. I would say the leader of the Conservative Party should be ashamed of himself, but it is clear that he has no shame.

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