Well, Peggy Nash, whatever respect I may have had for you is gone now. And many thought that if she won the leadership, she would steer the NDP further to the left! Ha!
You see, boys ‘n’ girls, in some kind of misguided attempt to win over Quebec support, Ms Nash was willing to allow Quebec to basically ignore the Canada Health Act. Let’s tune into what she said about the Quebec government’s desire to charge user fees to use the health care system, shall we?
During a debate with fellow contenders in Quebec City, Nash was asked how she would react if the Quebec government decided to charge patients user fees every time they went to a doctor or hospital.
“It’s a provincial decision so it’s the decision of Quebecers,” was her answer.
“It’s a provincial decision”. I dunno, Peg, that sounds an awful lot like what Harper has said about universal health care.
…but the fact is sometimes provinces have allowed in the past few years, they’ve brought in private services covered by public health insurance… Why do I care and why do we care as a federal government how they’re managed?
Well, it’s similar. Granted, Peggy Nash only seemed to speak of Quebec, while Stevie spoke of all of Canada.
Thomas Walkom had better ideas as to how Peggy Nash could’ve answered that question.
Sure Quebec can have user fees, she could have said. But if my party wins power federally it won’t get a dime from us.
And she could have pointed out that Quebecers, just like other Canadians, value medicare, which is why Charest eventually backed down.
It’s true, many of us Quebecers can remember the Quebec budget of 2012, and how at that time, both finance minister Raymond Bachand and Premier Johnny-Boy announced that they would add a 25$ user fee–cost of 25$ everytime someone saw a doctor and/or visited a health care facility. As Mr. Walkom said, Premier Johnny-boy did walk that one back, but not after a lot of demonstrations against those blasted fees. Protests were happening on a regular basis. Did anyone from the NDP (or other parties, for that matter) not pay any attention to that? By the by, boys ‘n’ girls, sometimes persistence does work. Anyway, message for Peggy, the NDP who think they are trying to gain Quebec votes by allowing Quebec governments (Yep, Pauline would do it too…let’s remember, she closed those hospitals and bought out doctor’s contracts and said she would do it again–we also know that ol’ Francois Legault and CAQ) to charge user fees to use the health care system, or any other measure to further privatize health care, please remember, you’re not out to please any Quebec government du jour; you must convince actual Quebecers to vote for you and most of us want to maintain universal health care and we most certainly don’t want user fees.
In fact, given that Quebec is the private for profit health care capital of Canada, one should look to see how it really doesn’t work here and how it really hasn’t shortened any waiting lists that existed before. It hasn’t improved accessibility to either private or public health care one bit. In fact, thanks to the 2010 budget, we now have to pay 200$/ year as of this year, billed at tax time, naturally. The year before, we paid 100$. I know it certainly hasn’t improved our health care system, nor universality. It certainly hasn’t made doctors more accommodating to patients.
H/T Lorne
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I knew there was a reason behind my lack of warmth towards Ms. Nash.
I started out supporting Topp, by default.
Then, I became interested in the ideas put forth by Cullen, Saganash and Ashton.
Nikki Ashton is a very bright young woman. I have no doubt that she has leadership abilities and strong fresh ideas. She’s very young though.
Saganash, I could support and did, until he dropped out.
Cullen, that’s who I support. He understands the importance of co-operation to achieve victory. That signifies a statesman who can use diplomacy to achieve peace and progress. He understands the deep resistance in BC to pipelines to nowhere and understands the importance of a national energy policy that consults the stakeholders, as in, the first nations, the working class and the importance of a diversified economy that includes the manufacturing sectors in eastern canada.
All told, I find the field of candidates to be bright and potentially cohesive under the right leadership. I see great ministerial potential in this field, regardless of the outcome.
Peggy has since “somewhat” clarified her position stating the following:
Peggy has since “somewhat” clarified her position stating the following:
You will notice that nowhere in the statement does she say Quebec will not get a darn thing from the federal government if user fees are imposed; something which I had hoped to hear in the clarification I knew was coming.
So does she support them? No, but in allowing them to happen without repercussions sure begs the question: if she doesn’t support the fees but would allow them to happen under her watch and continue to let health transfers flow, how are you different from the Conservatives on healthcare?
Sorry for the double first line above. Oops.
Kim: I started as a strong supporter of Nash until I found her campaign vacant of policy and was one that was based on talking points, nothing more. I talked with Nathan Cullen and while I agree with his joint nomination idea I wanted a candidate who I felt not only had sound plans and policy but was a strong grassroots supporter. Hence my favoring of Paul Dewar. Yes yes, the meme of his French has spread like wild fire, but the general concensus I’ve gathered from many french speakers is that his french is improving and is very similar to Jack Layton’s colloquial, comfortable french.
Here is my ballot for you to peruse if you are so interested:
1)Dewar 2)Mulcair 3)Cullen 4)Ashton 5)Singh 6)Topp 7)Nash
Peggy Nash was good in the Women’s Caucus mtg at the BC NDP convention, but when I tried to talk with her about the universality of OAS, and how people with $50,000 plus are still getting it, she said, “Oh, no, that she believed in that, just tax them on it.”
That to me is a silly way to do business
Wealthy Canadians used to get the Universal Child Tax credit too