OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he’s committed to working with provinces to ease some of the “real pressures” on the Canadian healthcare system, but any new investments must deliver results for Canadians.
Trudeau said at a press conference Wednesday no other prime minister in history has met with the premiers to discuss health care as many times as he has in the last two years, and he said he’ll continue to work with them to reduce wait times for a family doctor, catch up on surgery delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and improve mental health supports, but he wouldn’t say whether that co-ordination would involve increasing health transfers.
The significant gaps in the healthcare system — categorized by many healthcare professionals as a system in crisis — was a focus of a meeting by the premiers in Victoria, B.C. this week.
The premiers criticized the prime minister as they pushed for a permanent increase in federal health transfers. They estimate the federal government accounts for about 22 per cent of the cost of health care for every Canadian, an amount they want bumped to 35 per cent.
“Yes, the federal government is going to be there, but our focus — every step of the way, and Canadians right across the country, in every province, will understand this — is making sure those dollars that we put in deliver real, tangible results for Canadians, in shorter wait times, in better services, in access to a family doctor, and that's what we've been pushing on, and that's what we're continuing to talk to the provinces about,” Trudeau said.
British Columbia Premier John Horgan hosted the premiers’ meeting this year, in their first in-person gathering since the pandemic began.
“It's not about coming with our begging bowl and saying ‘Please, sir, give us some more',” Horgan said Tuesday, in reference to "Oliver Twist."
Trudeau said past investments in healthcare by federal and provincial governments haven't always delivered on the necessary long-term improvements to the system.
“Coming out of this pandemic, we have an opportunity to not just invest more, which we will, but to make sure that those investments are felt by families, felt by seniors, by the people who need services, mental health, but also felt by those heroes in the system: the nurses, doctors, orderlies and hospital workers who've been stretched thin, burned out, and challenged by this,” Trudeau said.
“Yes, the federal government will be there to invest in health care, but we are going to make sure that those investments deliver for Canadians,” he also said.
The federal government committed to send the provinces $2 billion in health top-ups in March. However, as The Canadian Press has reported, the funding meant to be put toward cutting down on surgical and diagnostic backlogs has still not been transferred.
