The Candice Malcolm Show - Trudeau pushes misinformation about Canada’s health care system

00:00:00.000 Canada's healthcare system is broken, but rather than trying to fix it, the Liberals are pushing

00:00:04.880 a superficial debate based on semantics, fear-mongering, and a three-decades-old

00:00:10.020 partisan attack. I'm Candace Malcolm, and this is The Candace Malcolm Show.

00:00:17.900 The Liberals have been running a shockingly bad campaign. Almost two weeks in, and we have seen

00:00:23.340 nothing but spectacular gaffe after spectacular gaffe. First, true to flip-flop on recognizing

00:00:29.080 the Taliban as a legitimate government of Afghanistan, and then, to make matters so much 0.83

00:00:34.500 worse, his pathetic minister for the status of women called the Taliban our brothers. Unbelievable. 0.94

00:00:41.980 And as the country is reeling with sky-high inflation and unfathomable debt levels, Trudeau just sort of

00:00:47.980 casually admits that he doesn't really think much about the government's money policy. Well, this week

00:00:53.740 the Trudeau government had the opportunity to get his campaign back on track, but instead, Trudeau's

00:00:58.960 Deputy Prime Minister and the country's Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland, released a patently

00:01:04.840 misleading video alleging that Conservative leader Erin O'Toole wants to privatize Canada's Medicare

00:01:10.740 system. It was so misleading that the social media giant Twitter slapped a label on the video warning

00:01:17.120 viewers that the content had been manipulated and was therefore false and misleading. I've mentioned it

00:01:22.720 on the show before, but it bears repeating. This is peak liberal hypocrisy and, I'll have to say, 0.88

00:01:29.100 top-notch irony. The Liberals have spent years warning us about the dangers of fake news online 0.89

00:01:35.920 and the need for the government to go in and crack down on it. They've introduced legislation pushing

00:01:40.860 for more censorship of what you can see and what you can share online. They want more power and more

00:01:46.060 control over the internet and they want Canadians to believe them and to trust them to say that they

00:01:51.820 are more trustworthy with this power than the Silicon Valley tech censors. So it was all just

00:01:57.460 too perfect that it was the Liberals themselves, it was Trudeau and Freeland, who were caught red-handed

00:02:03.020 pushing fake news, pushing falsehoods and misinformation, and that they were punished for this during the

00:02:09.260 campaign. That one will come back to haunt them should they ever form government again and try to push

00:02:14.740 their censorship agenda again. But rather than acknowledge that they went over their skis on

00:02:19.820 this one, they've instead decided to double down and continue to push the storyline behind this

00:02:25.620 disingenuous video. These guys have no sense of self-awareness and no sense of decency. So instead,

00:02:31.780 this is what we see this week. And so it really, really matters and it matters for the future.

00:02:39.460 Um, we put out, I think we put this out already. If not, you guys are going to get the scoop on the

00:02:45.320 rest of the country. But we tweeted out some video of Aaron O'Toole during the conservative

00:02:53.460 leadership campaign, where he talks about privatizing Medicare. Can you believe that?

00:03:00.120 No, Christia Freeland, O'Toole did not talk about privatizing Medicare. That's not what he said,

00:03:04.760 and that's not his position. In the clip that Freeland shared, the one that got slapped with the

00:03:08.780 manipulated media tag on Twitter, O'Toole talked about utilizing more private delivery options

00:03:14.440 of healthcare within the public universal system. There is a difference, a huge difference. But

00:03:20.620 rather than having a thoughtful and nuanced debate about healthcare, where we look at our system and

00:03:25.720 we try to figure out how we can improve upon it, how we as Canadians can have the best delivery and the

00:03:30.540 best healthcare possible, these liberal politicians are instead determined to take the conservative

00:03:36.520 position out of context to manipulate the truth, to spin it into partisan talking points, and to use those

00:03:43.040 talking points to bludgeon conservatives over the head while fear-mongering Canadians. So right on cue,

00:03:49.080 liberal leader Justin Trudeau dumbs down this message even more and releases this astonishingly stupid video. 0.99

00:03:57.180 So after days of avoiding it, Aaron O'Toole confirmed he wants to bring private, for-profit healthcare to 0.99

00:04:03.780 Canada. He said he supports choice in healthcare, which means letting the wealthiest pay to jump ahead

00:04:09.820 in line. We believe in strengthening universal public healthcare for everyone. That's why we're

00:04:15.880 investing in more doctors and nurses, shorter wait times, and better healthcare. Conservative cuts would

00:04:22.340 take us backwards. Let's keep moving forward for everyone. Now I want to spend some time on the

00:04:27.820 podcast breaking this down, explaining how superficial and how bad it is, and I know it's obvious to anyone

00:04:32.820 who watches it just how bad and superficial it is, but I think it's worth spending time to go through

00:04:38.420 line by line, because I think Canadians deserve better than this trite and partisan debate on healthcare,

00:04:44.820 and almost everything that Justin Trudeau says in this video is either wrong, it's missing context,

00:04:50.780 or it's just plain bizarre in terms of its messaging and strategy. And I will apologize in advance,

00:04:56.980 because I know the audience, and I know that this is a little more Trudeau than most Canadians can

00:05:02.520 handle, but we're going to do it anyway, so here we go. So first he starts off by saying this.

00:05:07.220 So after days of avoiding it. What do you mean avoiding it? The very first five words out of

00:05:11.940 Justin Trudeau's mouth are just not true. So let's just go to the timeline very quickly.

00:05:16.200 Christia Freeland released her misleading video on Sunday, and by Monday Twitter had slapped that

00:05:21.760 warning label on it. Now Trudeau recorded this little selfie video on Tuesday, so it wasn't

00:05:26.680 days of O'Toole avoiding it. And besides, O'Toole didn't avoid it. He was asked quickly about his

00:05:32.520 position by the media, and he answered it. He answered it in the same way he had in the past,

00:05:37.400 in the same way as it appeared in the conservative platform. So no, O'Toole wasn't avoiding it,

00:05:43.060 and no, it's not like he changed his position. Now next, Trudeau contends this.

00:05:48.620 Aaron O'Toole confirmed he wants to bring private, for-profit healthcare to Canada.

00:05:53.660 Now first, I do find it a little amusing that Trudeau uses words like private and for-profit

00:05:59.180 as if they're taboo. I have a newsflash to Trudeau. We live in a market economy here in Canada.

00:06:05.120 Basically everything that we buy, everything that we have, all those services, are based on private

00:06:10.620 and for-profit service. That's how markets work. That's how you get everything from food to housing

00:06:15.880 to clothing. Even schools have private options. So it's so weird, just on the surface, that we

00:06:21.200 scaremonger around terms like private and for-profit. And I have another newsflash for Justin Trudeau,

00:06:27.560 and that is that the majority of healthcare services in Canada, in this country, are already private and

00:06:33.880 for-profit. That's right. We already do private care. We already do for-profit care in Canada.

00:06:38.520 That now makes up the majority of our healthcare system. I'm going to read from Sean Spear's recent

00:06:43.540 piece in The Hub. It's really good. If you don't know about The Hub, you should go check it out.

00:06:47.320 Sean Spear is very, very good at this sort of policy breakdown. So this is what he has to say

00:06:52.420 about healthcare. And again, he's talking about this controversy. So he says,

00:06:56.560 O'Toole was quickly asked about it by journalists, and he reiterated his position, which remains that

00:07:00.900 he wants to partner with private sector delivery companies to improve the universal public system.

00:07:05.580 Canada's Medicare model of compulsory single-payer insurance is already a hybrid model. Single-payer

00:07:12.000 insurance only covers medically necessary services that are narrowly defined as those provided by a

00:07:17.360 physician or in a hospital. It doesn't extend to other parts of Canadian's healthcare, including

00:07:22.220 prescription drugs, long-term care, or home services. For those non-insured services, we have a

00:07:27.320 combination of public subsidies, employer-provided insurance, or out-of-pocket spending. What portion of

00:07:32.820 overall healthcare is covered by single-payer insurance? Less than half. The parts of the

00:07:37.760 healthcare system not subject to Medicare now represent 55% of all healthcare spending in Canada.

00:07:44.820 So yeah, the weird notion that Canada has this pure 100% public system isn't true. It just doesn't. We

00:07:50.860 don't have that. We have a hybrid model that is weirdly restrictive when it comes to mixing. So we

00:07:55.680 can't have private money or private delivery in the narrowly defined public areas, and there's

00:08:00.580 insufficient public support for everything else. Except, of course, it's not even the case because

00:08:05.300 we're seeing increasing private alternatives, places like the Canby Clinic in Vancouver that offer

00:08:10.060 private competition, as well as private clinics popping up all over Quebec because of a 2005 Supreme Court

00:08:16.360 case called the Chewy case, which ruled in favor of private delivery. That's a topic for another day, but

00:08:21.660 still, it shows how misleading Trudeau is being, or perhaps how ignorant he is of Canada's healthcare

00:08:26.540 system, and how he sort of goes back to these very basic, very banal talking points when he's talking

00:08:33.040 about healthcare. Platitudes, really, not even talking points. Anyway, so first he evoked fear over

00:08:38.940 generally uncontroversial words like private and pro-profit, and then he goes even worse and goes even

00:08:44.140 deeper down this rabbit hole. Let's play the next part here. This is really something.

00:08:48.240 He said he supports choice in healthcare, which means letting the wealthiest pay to jump ahead in line.

00:08:53.840 So now we're trying to hear a liberal politician fearmonger over the word choice? Are we supposed

00:09:00.240 to believe that choice is a bad thing, that we don't want to have choice in our healthcare? Again,

00:09:05.780 Trudeau, free people like choice. In fact, when it comes to the liberals' own position on abortion,

00:09:11.020 they lean heavily on the euphemism pro-choice. So why are they all of a sudden anti-choice when it

00:09:16.220 comes to the broader healthcare issue and the broader healthcare system in Canada? I really don't

00:09:20.720 understand this language here. And also this line about the wealthiest would pay to get ahead. Well,

00:09:27.060 that's not even true because if you're talking about a private alternative, it's not the same

00:09:31.820 queue. It's a separate queue. They're going into a totally different line, which makes the original

00:09:36.720 line shorter. So think about it. Imagine just for instance that you're in Soviet Russia and you want

00:09:42.580 to buy a loaf of bread. You have to wait two hours in line for that bread. Say there's a hundred people

00:09:47.260 in front of you. But then someone comes along and says, hey, I have the same bread, but I'm going to

00:09:52.780 charge you twice as much for the bread. And so all of a sudden you have a separate option. Say 25 people

00:09:59.440 decide to go and pay double to get their bread faster. And you decide that you don't want to

00:10:04.920 leave. You don't want to pay more. You're going to stay in the original line. Well, when the 25 people

00:10:09.160 leave, your line just got 25% shorter. So in this example, instead of waiting two hours, you would now

00:10:15.000 wait an hour and a half. So the people who wanted to pay more for bread got their bread faster. They

00:10:20.380 had to pay more. The people who didn't had to wait less. So it really is a win-win situation. That's

00:10:26.220 what we're talking about here. Even Canadians who don't want to have to pay out of pocket or don't

00:10:30.040 want to have to pay more should still welcome the idea that other people who want to pay more can

00:10:35.140 leave the public queues and make those shorter. It's worth noting this is already the case in Saskatchewan

00:10:40.320 with their new program that allows providers to charge Canadians who want to get an MRI faster.

00:10:45.620 But again, Trudeau is just simply not being honest. Next, he says this.

00:10:50.100 We believe in strengthening universal public health care for everyone. That's why we're investing in

00:10:55.700 more doctors and nurses, shorter wait times and better health care.

00:10:59.860 And now again, sure, liberals may believe in strengthening public universal health care,

00:11:04.160 but that's also Aaron O'Toole's position. I'll read you a little bit from the Conservative platform

00:11:08.420 because this is really the same thing that he's talking about. So first, he says he wants to

00:11:11.860 partner with private sector rather than over-rely on the government. We know there are some things

00:11:17.320 best done by the private sector and it will be faster to reach out for help. He also says that

00:11:22.260 Canada's Conservatives will meet with the premiers within the first 100 days of forming a government

00:11:26.360 to propose a new health agreement with the provinces and territories that boosts the annual growth

00:11:31.480 rate of the Canada health transfer to at least 6%. This will inject nearly $60 billion

00:11:37.100 into our health care system over the next 10 years. It's worth noting that that is the largest

00:11:41.560 ticket item in the Conservative platform. So the biggest thing that they want to spend money on

00:11:45.840 is increasing the amount of public health care that goes to the provinces. And so what they're

00:11:51.540 calling for is an increase over what the Liberals are calling for. So the Conservatives are actually

00:11:55.880 calling for more money to go into the public health care system. Next, O'Toole says that he will

00:12:00.860 create a pilot program to provide $150 million over three years in grants to non-profits and charities

00:12:06.420 delivering mental health and well-being programs. So again, back to what Sean Spear was talking about,

00:12:11.440 O'Toole wants to broaden what is considered public health care. So bring in more things that right

00:12:17.540 now are privately delivered and allow more money to go from the public side. So in some ways what

00:12:22.920 O'Toole is calling for is broader, more comprehensive public health care than what Trudeau says.

00:12:28.380 But again, Trudeau just isn't being honest, which is why it's even more absurd that Trudeau says this.

00:12:34.240 Conservative cuts would take us backwards. Let's keep moving forward for everyone.

00:12:40.740 So again, there are no cuts. O'Toole is talking about increasing public money in universal health

00:12:45.260 care as well as increasing private investment so there's more money on two fronts and yet somehow

00:12:50.840 the Liberals still call it cuts with a straight face. Only a Liberal could circle that square.

00:12:56.380 And this is the problem. Trudeau's video smacked of desperation. You can see how desperate he is in

00:13:01.260 that video. He's panicking and that's why he's resorting to these half-truths and this partisan

00:13:05.600 spin. But it's also remarkably out of touch and dated. I couldn't help but thinking about how it's

00:13:11.520 2021 and Trudeau and the Liberals are resorting and relying on the exact same line of attack that

00:13:17.120 they've been using for over 20 years. It's like a throwback to the 2000 election campaign.

00:13:23.140 So back in that 2000 election campaign, Liberal leader Jean-Claude Chen released a misleading attack

00:13:28.540 ad against Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day, alleging that Day would bring in private

00:13:33.440 two-tier health care. Day was so desperate to refute that mischaracterization that he held up

00:13:38.780 a sign during the debate insisting that it wasn't true. But really, Craig, why people are concerned

00:13:43.840 about the Canadian health care system and the Canadian Alliance position, something very serious

00:13:49.800 has happened here. I have said consistently and our policy is very clear and I'll say it again and

00:13:54.640 the whole country has seen our briefing notes. You may as well look at them too. No two-tier health

00:13:58.420 care. Now I've said that very clearly. So back 21 years ago, that seemed to work for the Liberals and

00:14:03.320 the Liberals formed a government after that election. But again, that was 21 years ago and it's almost like

00:14:08.900 the Liberals are stuck in a time warp. Canadians know that our health care system is failing. We know that

00:14:15.020 there are ridiculous cues and intense rationing happening in our health care. We know that going into a

00:14:20.260 hospital and seeing a doctor is a slow and painful experience, especially if you're living with

00:14:25.280 chronic pain or chronic illness, or if you're going in for a routine procedure, or even if you're going

00:14:30.500 in for a checkup, for instance, during pregnancy. I know women who literally don't know the doctor

00:14:36.200 who delivered their baby because it was such a rush. The doctor was in and out so quickly,

00:14:41.120 they don't even know who it was. And that's especially the case in the big cities. Can you imagine?

00:14:45.740 That's not the kind of care that Canadians deserve. And we also know that COVID has stretched your

00:14:50.900 health care system to its limits. And that even compared to other rich and developed countries,

00:14:56.260 Canada routinely ranks at or near the bottom of those ranking lists. And Canadians know that we

00:15:01.880 already pay out of pocket and that there already is private and for-profit health care here in Canada.

00:15:07.120 We see private clinics all over cities like Montreal and Vancouver. And we know, for instance,

00:15:11.420 that you can now get that MRI in Saskatchewan by paying. We also know that we pay out of pocket

00:15:16.200 for most of our health care services, including dental, physio, optometry, long-term care,

00:15:21.440 and prescription drugs. Those are all already private. So seeing Trudeau dumb down the message

00:15:26.560 and making these absurd statements and pushing this partisan spin, well, it just doesn't come across

00:15:32.000 very well. It comes across as desperate, condescending, misleading, and just plain wrong.

00:15:37.620 The liberals are stuck in the past. That's especially the case when it comes to health care.

00:15:41.840 And it's becoming more and more obvious that we just really need a change here in Canada.

00:15:46.000 I'm Candice Malcolm, and this is The Candice Malcolm Show.

The Candice Malcolm Show - August 26, 2021

Trudeau pushes misinformation about Canada’s health care system

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