In case anyone is interested, there has been no activity on the pharmacare bill the federal government introduced a month ago and bragged about as a “giant step forward for our health system” and “a concrete step toward true and lasting gender equality.”
I am of course unsurprised, and I’m annoyed anew at everyone who participated in the farce. But also I’m thinking more broadly about arbitrary deadlines.
I would guess the NDP set a March 1 deadline in the hopes that would be enough time to pass before the summer break. I’d also guess both they and the Liberals liked the symbolism of introducing the bill on February 29. How historic!
And promptly the newly introduced bill – “a game-changer for millions of people” – was plonked onto the “for later” shelf. Press conference over; millions of people can keep waiting.
Probably lots of employees depleted themselves to prepare that bill in time for the arbitrary deadline, for what practical difference? Why do we celebrate this way of life / governance?
I caught a news report today that said there will indeed be money in the upcoming federal budget for contraception and insulin. Here are my questions that the report didn’t answer:
So was the Minister wrong when he said there wouldn’t be funds in the budget for this, or was the plan changed at some point in the last month? If it’s important enough to budget money towards it, why wasn’t it important to progress the legislation? (Is this just more press conferences and more posturing?)