Health Committee on June 17th, 2024

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

The City of Montreal made a request to go towards the British Columbia model. Has that been rejected?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

I believe the mayor of Montreal was very clear in her public media statements that there is no such request at Health Canada.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

How many applications are in to Health Canada to adopt a B.C.-like model of legalization of hard drugs and are currently sitting with your department?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

I'll ask an official to answer that, but to my knowledge there are none.

Do you want to say that is correct?

[Eric Costen]

That's correct, yes. There are none.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

There are currently no applications whatsoever that have been received by Health Canada.

Will you commit now to rejecting any future applications that will go forward?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

I don't deal with hypotheticals. I address each community and their requests in addressing the overdose crisis in their community and their knowledge and understanding of what they deem is best. Then we trust evidence, science, expertise and health care service provision.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, Ms. Goodridge.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Given the large workload the committee has on the docket and the—

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

We're going to go to Dr. Hanley, please, for five minutes.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you very much, Minister and officials, for appearing.

We have just heard in the last questions what I think is an ongoing stigmatization of drug use, in this case around an exempted supervised consumption site in proximity to public settings. I feel this is one part of confusing the public usage of drugs and decriminalization, and trying to establish a causation between the two.

I also hear blaming the toxic drug crisis on diverted hydromorphone. I've also heard of demonizing the use of diacetylmorphine as an example of, under very strict conditions, using medical therapy for addiction.

Can you comment on the role of disinformation and how this is affecting our ability to work with partners, provinces and territories to address the toxic drug crisis?

[Ya'ara Saks, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Certainly, my department and I are focused on saving lives and connecting people to health care. That is our first priority. We don't subscribe to the Conservatives' ideological and often ignorant approach when it comes to the overdose crisis and the illegal toxic drug supply. It's frankly—

[Stephen Ellis, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Go ahead, Dr. Ellis.

[Stephen Ellis, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

I think this meeting has been going reasonably well. I think that using inflammatory remarks, such as the word the minister has chosen to use at the current time, really is not conducive to furthering this conversation, especially when the member opposite has raised the sensitive topic of disinformation.

I would suggest that just because someone doesn't agree with the minister, it doesn't make them ignorant. If we're going to be doing name-calling here, I think we could descend very quickly into a state of back-and-forth, which will not be productive.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Do you also have a point of order, Ms. Kayabaga?

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

I think that our colleague opposite has been making similar comments. The minister is making her comments, and I would like to hear from her.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

This has been a charged meeting from the get-go. This is for the minister and for the people posing questions: Let's all see if we can turn down the temperature in selecting our language. I'm not necessarily singling you out, Minister, because some of the questions have been fairly sharp as well, but we all have a role to play.

Do you have another point of order, Ms. Kayabaga?

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

I do.

Our colleague has also.... He did call the minister clueless prior to his comments. I think that we should rein in those comments.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

I'm cognizant of that, which is why I phrased my response in the way that I did.

Thank you.

[Stephen Ellis, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

I have a point of order.

[Brendan Hanley, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

We have points of order from Dr. Ellis and Dr. Hanley, but we're now descending into debate. I've made my ruling. I've asked people to tone it down. I don't think we need to beat this to death, but I'll hear you out.

Go ahead.

[Stephen Ellis, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester, NS]

Thanks very much, Chair.

I would suggest that if someone doesn't know the answer to a clearly answerable question, then they are actually clueless.