SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Mrs. Élisabeth Brière (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development and to the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health, Lib.)

May/30/24 3:03:42 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what we have been hearing from the Conservative side is dehumanizing. They are basically saying that we need to clean up the streets because these people are a bother. On this side of the House, we are here to help people who use drugs. They did not choose to become addicts. They did not wake up one morning and say that they were going to start using drugs. The important thing is to give them a range of options so that they can find their way forward and overcome their addiction, which is not a criminal law problem. It is a mental health problem.

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Mrs. Élisabeth Brière (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development and to the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health, Lib.)

May/30/24 3:05:19 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I also happen to sit on the Standing Committee on Health. In recent meetings, we heard what my colleague from the other side just said. We also heard that we need to have a whole range of options, because there is more than one way of getting off drugs. We need many options, strategies and initiatives that could potentially suit everyone. That is the direction we are heading in. With respect to the application for exemption, we have not received one from Montreal yet. If that happens, we will do what we need to do.

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Mr. Tom Kmiec (Calgary Shepard, CPC)

May/30/24 6:54:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is hard to know where to begin with the speech the parliamentary secretary just gave. I have heard some of this before at rare diseases conferences. I just want people at home to know that not a single rare disease drug would be paid for through this legislation. That is for starters. It is only mentioned once in this entire piece of legislation. Second of all, the Canadian drug agency is not created. CADTH is being repurposed and renamed into the CDA. My question, though, is specifically on rare diseases because the parliamentary secretary mentioned them. Of the $1.5 billion announced all the way back in 2019, $1.4 billion is still left unspent. Could the member tell me which rare disease drugs were covered between 2019 and today, which patients received the drugs and for what conditions?

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Mr. Jean-Denis Garon

May/30/24 7:14:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is an interesting question. One thing is for certain: If the federal government has money for the provinces to cover more drugs, then perhaps even more drugs could be covered if the money is sent to the provinces and they are given the right to opt out with full compensation so that they can expand programs with existing infrastructure. However, Ottawa has this bad habit of creating structures, bureaucracy and new layers of all sorts of things that cost a lot of money. Then we end up with dental care plans like the Liberal plan that ultimately involves the private sector, which runs counter to the very principle of the Canada Health Act if it were subject to it. That is what we end up with. These are failures after failures. What is the point of all this? It is about campaigning for the Liberals and the NDP.

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Ms. Heather McPherson (Edmonton Strathcona, NDP)

May/30/24 10:33:10 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have worked with the member very closely on a number of files, and I know him to be a very honourable member of this place. He referenced the Hoskins report many times, and of course this is the report that was commissioned by the government to look at this. It found that $5 billion of savings would be available if we were to put in a national pharmacare program. Like the member, I recognize that this is not a full pharmacare program. This is a framework on which we could build a pharmacare program. Could the member comment on the medications or drugs that he thinks should be next in the pharmacare program now that we have dedicated this particular step to diabetes medication and devices and to contraceptives?

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/30/24

Mr. Marcus Powlowski

May/30/24 10:34:00 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the member's question is very pertinent. I have some background in this. Once upon a time, years ago, I worked in a tiny country in the South Pacific, Vanuatu, on its essential drug list, which was its first essential drug list. The WHO is trying to do this with a lot of countries. Similarly in Canada, this act calls for the creation of an essential drug list. On that essential drug list, we would have the input of physicians and other specialists from across Canada to determine what the priority drugs are that a government finance system ought to supply its citizenry. That is an important question, and it is one of the next steps. I, like her, realize that this does not bring us to a national pharmacare system, but it is an important step on the way to that.

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Context: House Hansard - 321 - May/31/24

Mrs. Tracy Gray

May/31/24 12:45:26 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what the government is doing is not balanced. The member speaks to what he considers successes of the Liberals' illicit-drug policies, but I would ask the member opposite why, if their policies are so fantastic and successful, they have been enacted only in British Columbia. Residents from my community are at ground zero of the toxic drug crisis's horribly sad results. Only B.C. families and small businesses have been forced to suffer the consequences of the poorly thought-out and increasingly tragic policy. The facts are clear. Overdoses are up, overdose deaths are up and addictions are up. Unsafe drug paraphernalia litter our parks, playgrounds and streets. Government-supplied, taxpayer-funded hard drugs are being diverted to criminals and to children. A common-sense Conservative government would end the failed NDP-Liberal drug experiment for good and make sure it is not allowed anywhere else in Canada. Conservatives will stop the crime and bring hope through addiction treatment and recovery to bring our loved ones home.

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