I like the sound of that. Pharmacare seems like an obviously good policy.
Are there any decent arguments against it?
The only real argument is “it’s too expensive,” so no.
It kind of seems like the Liberals are freaking out about finances right now. They don’t want to keep running big deficits, but they’re also afraid to hike taxes while they’re already weak in the polls, so they’re resorting to things like cutting defence spending in a moment where the world is edging towards war.
In the end higher taxes are probably what needs to happen. The conservatives will razz them for it, but that’s much better even from a purely electoral standpoint then a snap election right now.
If they tax the RICH like they promised they won’t be in that position. BUT their benefactors are the rich so they are afraid of offending their patrons.
I though pharmacare was one of those things that paid for itself with the single point of negotiation and reduced need for emergency care? I don’t really remember the numbers…
Well, emergency care is also a provincial responsibility, and a single point of negotiation is moot from a federal budget perspective if the alternative is to pay nothing and let people fend for themselves. To society I’m sure it’s the better, cheaper option, though.
You don’t see those results immediately, so it’s easy to campaign against at first.
My only concern is that they’ll have to get the provinces on-side, or face a prolonged uphill battle of challenges that will delay it for years.
Given how hard it was to get some of the provinces to agree to dental and child care (which still aren’t fully implemented yet), I can’t see this being any less painful.
Might be ok for Manitoba now…
Previously, all aid (covid, healthcare, etc) was just redirected to debt
This is the best summary I could come up with:
New Democrats have resoundingly urged their party to stand firm on negotiating pharmacare, even if it means ending their political agreement with the Liberals.
But it signals that the NDP caucus would have the backing of the party’s membership to walk away from the arrangement if the Liberals won’t agree to a public, universal, single-payer system.
The Liberal minority government relies on New Democrats’ votes to pass legislation through a formal agreement that both parties signed.
In addition to pushing for legislation on pharmacare, Davies is continuing to negotiate the expanded rollout of dental care for low-income Canadians.
Under the NDP-Liberal deal, both parties committed to providing government-subsidized dental coverage for children under 18, persons with disabilities and seniors over 65 by the end of 2023.
Instead of cutting cheques as it did when the plan first began covering children under 12, Davies said an enrolment program would launch offering dental coverage through the insurance company Sun Life in December.
The original article contains 649 words, the summary contains 159 words. Saved 76%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
