Monday, December 05, 2005

Is there anyone out there who understands Jack Layton's health care position?

Just thought I'd ask.

posted by calgarygrit at 12:59 p.m.

33 Comments:

  • Yes.

    Just thought I'd answer.

    By Blogger AJSomerset, at 1:25 p.m.  

  • Yes.

    Short version: private health care is legal. Clinics can either get public funds or private funds but not both--in other words, a clinic that charges patients for services that are covered by medicare must charge the patient 100% of the cost for that service, not just a premium on top of public funding.

    This is actually what teh Canada Health Act says, but the federal government hasn't enforced it.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:31 p.m.  

  • these folks are giving it a shot.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:33 p.m.  

  • What kevin is describing is called extra billing and is a violation of the heath act but show me an example of where the feds are not enforcing this?

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:35 p.m.  

  • OK.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:39 p.m.  

  • Does anyone else find it just a "tad" hypocritical that the NDP says "NO" to private, for profit health care, but attacks anyone who opposed public funding of Henry Morgentalers chain of "MC-Bortion" clinics?

    Seems old Jackie boy wants to have his cake and eat it to.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:39 p.m.  

  • "EVOLVING"

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 1:47 p.m.  

  • No, I don't. And I don't want to have to go through a whole bunch of explanations to understand it either. All I know is that about 10 days ago he gave us a Christmas election because Martin was not promising to do something that Layton now says he won't do either.

    By Blogger mezba, at 2:11 p.m.  

  • C'mon, Mezba, I just explained his position in three sentences.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:18 p.m.  

  • Thank you Kevin, I notice that this example is in Quebec - typical if it was any where else the Liberals would have enforced and sanctioned the province they won't do it for Quebecers. How sad that they think Quebec is less deserving of the protections of the canada health act.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:40 p.m.  

  • Anonymous:

    If you mess with private health in Quebec - you mess with Paul Martin's health care.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 2:48 p.m.  

  • Kevin;

    Isn't that basically a two tier system? Even Harper has said private delivery in the public system, but no out of pocket payments.

    By Blogger calgarygrit, at 3:26 p.m.  

  • No.

    For the record.

    By Blogger Ryan Ringer, at 3:45 p.m.  

  • If you mess with private health in Quebec - you mess with Paul Martin's health care.

    He uses public health care?

    By Blogger NorthBayTrapper, at 3:46 p.m.  

  • Well, the reality is that you can have private health care today--it's just that the Canada Health Act says that the federal government will claw back any public funds that go to private clinics (and can, in theory, impose further punitive cuts).

    However, the feds don't have the legal authority to outlaw private care. All they can do is deny funding, which has been enough to keep most provinces from going down that road. Layton is saying that he wants the federal government to start using that stick more often.

    Strictly speaking, this does mean that we have two-tier health care today, but since very few people go outside the public system it hasn't been a big issue.

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4:27 p.m.  

  • This is completely aside but it looks like CG's election predictions made it into today's Hill Times. And you had almost the exact same pick as Rick Mercer...

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4:32 p.m.  

  • Watching the NDP Pundit, Brad something or other, on CBC Politics this Monday morning trying to spin out of the hole Layton just tossed the party into... well, it looks like they are in an incoherent position.

    How I interpret what they are sayhing is they want a 100% public system, with no room for private delivery at all, because this is their ideal picture of how the status quo is. However, they have just rudely discovered that private health care clinics and doctors have always been part of the system (e.g. family doctors, etc.).

    What makes this really disturbing is that you would think a federal party that has campaigned on this as issue #1 for a decade would have known this? But they apparently did not.

    What's with that? Anybody know?

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 5:06 p.m.  

  • I haven't seen the NDP pundit, but the position isn't incoherent at all - if someone wants to charge more than the scheduled amount for a service they don't get any public money. That's it, that's all. If the NDP can't say that, they're idiots, but having read the Star story I'd be more suspicious of the media messing it up, because the Star sure did.

    Not that the Star is known to have any political biases that would make having Canadians think there is no difference between the Liberal and NDP position.

    Nope.

    Ian

    By Anonymous Anonymous, at 11:32 a.m.  

  • The NDP's position is really quite straightforward: Keep the Canada Health Act the way it is, and actually follow it.

    Whereas the Liberal position is to keep it the way it is, and ignore it.

    By Blogger Billy, at 3:14 p.m.  

  • Maybe a better question is why private health care providers are unwilling to set up services unless they can be guaranteed access to full flow from the public teat?

    By Blogger Glen, at 9:05 a.m.  

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