Justin Trudeau promises new health accord, improved home care

A Liberal government would negotiate a new health accord with the provinces and territories that includeslong-term funding for improvedhomecare for an aging population, party leader Justin Trudeau said Wednesday.

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The country's previous$41-billion,10-year Canada Health Accord expired in March 2014 and was not renewed by the Conservative government. The movepromptedan outcry from groups representing health-care providers and patients,who argued that the health-care needs of some provinces would be deeply underfunded in the absence of an agreement.

As part of a renewed focus on improving the Canadian health-care system, Trudeau said,the Liberals would invest $3 billion over the next four years to provide additional and improved services for the nearly two million people currently receiving care at home.

A Grit government would also place significant emphasis on the construction of new affordable housing for seniors and seniors' facilities, including long-term care homes.

"We are at a critical junction in the history of health care in Canada," saidTrudeau during acampaign stop at a seniors' home in Surrey, B.C.

He wasalluding to data released from Statistics Canada this week that showed there are now more Canadians over the age of 65 than there are under the age of 15.

"Stephen Harper and the Conservatives have had 10 years to plan for this fundamentalshift that everyone saw coming, yet they have done nothing," he said.

"The odds are good that we all know one who has used the home-care system, maybe a family member or a close friend. And as our population ages, the number of Canadians in need of long-term care will only rise."

In addition to improved home care, the new health accordwould prioritizeboostingaccess to and reducing the costs of prescription drugs for the provinces and territories by buying them in bulk, as well as increasing access to improved mental health services, particularly for veterans and first responders living with post-traumatic stress disorder.

There would also be an effort to encourage "pan-Canadian collaboration" on innovative new health-care practices so that they can be adopted and implemented by providers across the country.

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Trudeaualso said he would sit down with leaders from each of the provinces and territories to discuss a possibleincrease to health transfers from the federal government to the provinces. When the Tories decided not to renegotiatethe health accord that expired in 2014, they also decided to slow the rate of increases in federal health-care transfers, starting in 2017 a change that would mean as much as $36 billion less for provincial coffers over the next 10years.

"Harper has refused to discuss the future of our health-care system. In fact, he has refused to sit down with the provinces to talk about it," Trudeausaid."Instead, he has worked unilaterally to undermine it."

Conservatives defend record

But Health Minister Rona Ambrose, the Conservative candidate for Sturgeon River-Parkland inAlberta, issued a statement disputing Trudeau's claims. She said the government has "significantly increased" health transfers to the provinces under Harper's watch.

Since 2006, healthtransfers have climbed to $34 billion from $20 billion, and theywill hit$40 billion by the end of the decade, Ambrose said.

"While health-care transfers to the provinces are now at record levels under our leadership,on their watchthe Liberals cut health care by 30 per cent to balance their budget on the backs of the provinces."

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair has promised to use any budget surpluses his government might achieve to reverse the cut to the health transfers implemented by the Conservatives.

Murray Rankin, the party's candidate for Victoria, said Trudeau's announcementfalls far short of the $4.8 billion needed to meet the critical sixpercenthealth-care escalator.

"You can't restore federal leadership on health care, or have a meaningful conversation with the provinces, if cuts are the first thing on the table," he said in a news release.

The Canadian Nurses Associationapplauded key parts of the Liberal plan, including the shift from hospital to community-based care, and a commitment to collaborate and innovate with provinces and territories to meet regional needs.

"The federal government must work to unite Canada's health-care system across the regions so that allCanadians are guaranteed the same access to safe, high-quality health care," the association wrote in a statement. "The government can also foster better care by identifying local innovations that can be scaled up into national solutions."

While the Liberalplan was "scarce" on implementation details, the nurses association called it a "positive start."