On December 19th. federal Finance Minister, Jim Flaherty,
dropped a bombshell by informing Canada’s provincial governments that the
annual six per cent increases in health transfers will not be guaranteed by
Ottawa after 2016. Instead of six per cent, the increase will be tied to the
rate of economic growth and inflation that Flaherty predicts will be in the
four per cent range. What genius! In this guy we have another economic expert
who knows exactly where the economy will be years from now!
Reaction from provincial ministers was immediate and
furious. Ontario Finance Minister, Dwight Duncan, said, “The anger among my
colleagues was absolutely palpable. There is no agreement. It’s a unilateral
federal offer. Our Christmas present this year is a lump of coal. This gives us
certainty all right - certainty that health care is being undermined. This is
an attack on public health care.” Manitoba’s Finance Minister, Stan Strothers,
was incensed by the high-handed actions of the federal government, “I’m open to
any discussion on any angle in terms of the whole ball of wax of transfers -
equalization, health, social transfers. I’m open to speaking with the minister
on any of that. We didn’t have that today. This was very unilateral.”
Ontario Premier, Dalton Mcguinty, was expecting to negotiate
with Prime Minister Harper, “The federal Conservative Party did, during the
election, make a commitment to six per cent and I expect them to honour that,
but it’s going to take more than just new dollars. It’s going to take
accountability, it’s going to take reforms, it’s going to take targets, and
we’ll have to hold our-selves to account for bringing about improvement.”
During the last election the Conservatives ‘suggested’ that,
if elected, they would continue with the annual six per cent in creases. Some
would say it’s just another example of a party making vote-winning promises
they had no intention of keeping. Others might argue that a broken promise
doesn’t necessarily mean insincerity, but that, once elected, the hard, cold
realities of administering capitalism force politicians to compromise with
their good intentions. Either way, it means the same thing - the working class,
who voted the government into power, will suffer.
Ottawa claims that with transfers at nearly $27 billion per
year, it cannot continue with the increases. Since the Conservative Party
stands for the continuation of capitalism, once elected, it becomes the
executive committee of the capitalist class, grappling with capitalism’s multiplicity
of problems while trying to manage the system in the interests of the owners of
capital. At present, Ottawa has a $31 billion budget deficit which Harper,
Flaherty and company have to reduce. As Flaherty said, “We all realize that
public finances relate to revenues and we can’t pretend to spend money we don’t
have.” Here we have a ridiculous situation where those who try to run
capitalism at a provincial level are getting shafted by those who try to run it
at the federal level. This would all be hilarious were the effects of their
actions not so serious on the ordinary worker. Those who need health care will
not always be able to access it. The absurdity of it all is emphasized by
McGuinty’s coments about the need for reforms.
The most significant question of all is ‘can this problem be
dealt with in capitalism?’ Can you have access to the health system when needed
while leaving the fundamentals of the capitalist system in tact? Socialists do
not oppose reforms, some of which, like medicare, are of benefit to the working
class. What we do not do is advocate them because we have something better to
advocate. What we do is point out the nature of the capitalist system and how
their benefits are mostly temporary. Medicare is beneficial to the capitalist
class also. In Britain, in 1939, when many thousands of young men were drafted
for the war, it was found that an alarming percentage were not fit ‘to fight
for king and country’ after a decade of depression era unemployment and poor
nutrition. Hence the British Health Act of 1948. Many called it ‘The Back To
Work Act’, implying, correctly, it was to repair an injured worker so he could
return all the sooner to be exploited. As early as 1951, this great reform was
in trouble with the addition of some prescription charges (initially free)
being added. Now everyone agrees the system is in a mess with the government
contracting out services and allowing a parallel private system. So much for
the permanence of reforms!
Here in Canada, we are all aware how the quality of health
care has declined and will do so even further with the reduction on transfers
to the provinces. Emergency waiting times have increased with too few
physicians on hand; patients wait longer for operations and are often sent home
too soon because beds are needed; some of our best medical specialists go into
the private sector or to another country for higher pay; many nurses are
employed part-time on contract where they are paid less and have few benefits.
It is about to get worse. It’s a case of starving the system of adequate funds
to help usher in a private system and a decades-long policy of reducing taxes
(and thereby increasing the portion of the surplus-value that goes to profits)
leaving all governments to do nothing but cut programs, including health.
There is only one answer, the democratic ownership and
management of the whole system of producing and distributing wealth. This would
necessarily mean the abolition of money and the production of goods and
services to meet the real needs of the whole community. In such a system, all
will contribute according to their abilities and take from the common pool
whatever they need. There will be no barrier for anyone seeking medical care or
anything else of the necessities of life. That will no longer depend on the
size of one’s bank account. That is socialism and it is ready to be implemented
now. Are you ready to work for it?