Quebecers will have to remember Justin Trudeau’s insufficient health care offer in the next federal election, says Quebec Premier François Legault. This is the ultimate lever to get more money and break the impasse in the negotiations for these transfers, he says.
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“There are several issues when you vote in an election. But, health for me is a really priority file, ”said Mr. Legault the day following the final offer of the government of Justin Trudeau in terms of health transfers.
“Quebecers and Canadians have to understand that what the federal government is doing doesn’t make sense. The federal government must do its fair share.”
According to François Legault, this issue should be the priority for Quebecers and Canadians in the next federal election.
“What I’m saying is that it’s not acceptable and Quebecers must take this into account,” said the Prime Minister.
“We have been unanimous for two and a half years. It’s not just Quebec, 13 provinces and territories were asking for $28 billion more. We got 4.6 billion per year more.”
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With this agreement, the federal government will only pay 24% of the bill instead of 22%.
Despite everything, he might accept the offer in order to complete the next budget and protect the common front with the other provinces.
“If I look at the situation in Quebec, we asked for $6 billion a year and we got regarding $1 billion. I prefer to have $1 billion and put it in the budget. The money we need to invest in health, we will invest anyway. It’s just that it will be more difficult when we look at the financial balance (…) It will affect our deficit in Quebec, ”he explained.
Yesterday, the Prime Minister was criticized for his lack of fighting spirit following the announcement of the federal offer. Mr. Legault explained that his attitude had been tinged with fatigue and disappointment.
A meeting with the other heads of the provinces is scheduled in the coming days to make the final decision.
“I asked that we continue the common front to ask for more. We will protect this common front. I want to talk to my colleagues first,” he said.
Legault crashed, according to QS
Québec solidaire spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois believes that François Legault bowed down to the federal government.
Photo Stevens LeBlanc
Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois
“Yesterday he should have been angry. What we saw him do was crash before the insulting offer of Justin Trudeau and the federal government,” he said. During question period, GND ridiculed the idea of Quebec interfering in the next federal election.
“Is he telling us he’s going to invite us to vote for Poilievre,” he said. “Maybe we might finance health with bitcoins.”
Solidarity MP Vincent Marissal added that the Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, must “a little freak out” seeing “the meager harvest that his leader brought back from Ottawa”.
“The offer that is on the table is not only insufficient, it is ridiculous,” he said.
Mr. Marissal hopes that the federal government’s offer will not push the Legault government to show austerity in the coming years.
“Are they going to do the trick of the Liberals of Charest and Couillard once more and cut in the mission of the State which is health?” he wondered.
“Naming” the sovereignist option
Faced with the “contempt” of the federal government in the file of health transfers, Prime Minister Legault should name the sovereignist option in order to restore a semblance of a balance of power, believes the Parti Québécois.
This is what PQ leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon said on Wednesday at a press briefing in parliament.
Photo Stevens LeBlanc
Paul St-Pierre Plamondon
“I urge François Legault to at least surrender to Bourassa’s level of nationalism,” he said, adding that he finds it hard to imagine that as he fell asleep last night, François Legault n did not have in mind that independence was a viable option for Quebec.
Asked whether Mr. Legault’s reaction should have been stronger, Mr. St-Pierre Plamondon expressed that the Prime Minister’s disappointment had “the merit of being clear”, but that he feels a a certain “resignation”, caused by the fatigue of always being shocked and of not having any real balance of power.
Given the fact that Quebec obtained “only one sixth” of what it asked for, that is to say one billion per year rather than six, the Legault government must table a “contingency plan”.
“It is the responsibility of the government to say what we are going to do with this money, and to say what we cannot do, given the fact that we are short of 5 billion to operate,” said said MP Pascal Bérubé.
The federal government offered an additional $46.2 billion over ten years. The provinces demanded that the federal contribution be increased from 22% to 35%, the equivalent of an additional $28 billion annually. The offer currently on the table instead provides for an annual injection of $4.87 billion across the country, or nearly six times less than what was hoped for.
Insufficient
The Liberals, in turn, said that the federal offer is insufficient and unacceptable. “The offer put forward yesterday will not allow Quebecers to have the health rights to which they are entitled,” said Liberal MP André Fortin.
Moreover, the Premier of Quebec, in the opinion of the Liberal Party of Quebec, failed in his negotiations and he let Quebec down.
“Mr. Legault has always made himself the great defender of Quebec, yesterday he abdicated the defense of the interests of Quebec and of Quebecers,” railed Mr. Fortin, who believes that François Legault should have “teared his shirt when he got out of his encounter”.
Moreover, Mr. Fortin believes that the Legault government has no problem with the balance of power vis-à-vis Ottawa. He pointed out that the CAQ is in the majority and “well in the saddle for 4 years”, while the federal Liberals are in the minority and constantly watched by the specter of an election.
