The Premiers met with Prime minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa on Tuesday to discuss the Federal Government’s 10-year Healthcare Plan. The Federal Government pledged to provide $46 Billion in new financing over the next 10 years, approximately $4.6 Billion annually. The Premiers wanted much more, asking for 28 Billion each year. The deal included an increase in the Canadian Health Transfer, which is an equal, per capita transfer to each province with limited strings attached. There would be a lot of face-to-face between individual provinces and the federal government. Whenever the federal government funds a program or project, Western Canada ends up footing a disproportionate share of the bill. Every federal program is subsidized by the taxpayers of the West.
Individual provinces will now be responsible for the management of their healthcare budgets and the funds received from Ottawa. The problem is, the more we shift programs from provincial to federal jurisdiction, the greater the financial disparity because the west is subsidized more and more. There is no fairness here. The fairest deal for the west isn’t for federal governments to spend more money on healthcare, but for the federal government to stop funding healthcare entirely. That way the federal government can cut taxes and return healthcare to the province’s jurisdiction, as it is in the Constitution.
Provinces can collect their taxes from their citizens, and spend it as they see fit. Alberta sees this deal as a way for the federal government to bribe and manipulate each province to do what the federal government wishes. Alberta’s Premier Danielle Smith said, “I know we have been passive for so long that the trend to forget that the Constitution actually gives us sovereignty in the matters that are enumerated to us”. Many Premiers see this deal as a way for the federal government to walk all over the province’s jurisdiction. Premier Smith also said “we always lose when we go up against Ottawa. They take our money and they dribble it back with conditions attached, stealing the rest and using the other revenue to buy votes in Quebec and Atlantic Canada“. The federal government has used power sharing or conditional financial transfer payments to interfere in provincial politics.
Canada needs to reimagine its power structure and end its massive federal overreach in almost every jurisdiction. Our Constitution is often ignored by the federal government, making new rules that favor federal politics and not the provinces.
Steven Kaszab
Bradford, Ontario
[email protected]
