Court ruling on health privatization should sound alarm: Layton
“Four times, people voted to keep medicare public and it’s time Martin listened”
Ottawa – NDP Leader Jack Layton and Health Critic Jean Crowder said today’s Supreme Court ruling should serve as a wake-up call to Paul Martin to honour the promises the Liberals have made to patients in four elections.
The court case was pursued by leading private health interests and a Liberal Senator. Its implications are narrow in the immediate term, affecting only Quebec, which has a provincial charter of rights and which is the home of the litigant.
“After 12 years of Liberal government, the privatization Mr. Martin pretends to oppose has grown and we’re still waiting for action on the ideas that will protect public medicare and improve it,” said Layton. “Today’s court ruling should again sound the alarm for Paul Martin, who keeps mistaking rhetoric for action.”
Across Canada, privatization has increased as a federal Liberal government withdraws from health accountability. In B.C., large new private clinics are opening. The for-profit hospitals Liberals campaigned against in 2000 are open in Alberta. Homecare is operated for-profit in Ontario and for-profit MRIs are expanding in Nova Scotia.
Martin’s hastily put-together health accord also contains no prohibitions against privatization, and the increased federal funding for health care has no meaningful conditions attached in another example of Martin failing to do what he promised.
“Public medicare is one of minority government’s proudest achievements that now forms a cornerstone of Canadian identity,” said Crowder. “Health Minister Dosanjh needs to protect and improve it, by reasserting a federal role in stopping privatization and pursuing the solutions that can control costs, improve care and keep medicare public.”
She said basic first steps such as bulk-buying prescription drugs – long recommended, but never acted upon – and ending practices such as the evergreening of drugs, which artificially extends patent protection are urgently required. Homecare and pharmacare, both key components of health reform, have never been priorities of the Liberals.
“Four times, people voted to keep health care public and yet over the last 12 years, Mr. Martin has failed to keep his election promises,” said Layton. “Inaction creates the longer waiting lists on which privatization flourishes, and abandoning federal leadership makes the situation worse. That’s not why people voted Liberal, and they deserve better.”
