Let's Call it What it is: Cutting Though Kenney's Privatization Double-Speak

Last week Jason Kenney’s health care announcement guaranteed "public funding" of our public health care, but stayed away from guaranteeing public delivery or an expansion of our current public system. He reiterated that he would not let “ideology” stand in their way of looking into alternate "options," including the use of private providers. There was no clarity as to what that would look like. Ideology only seems to come into play when you don’t agree with it. It is naïve to believe that political parties do not have an ideology guiding their policies.

For Friends of Medicare, it is very simple: what guides our work for a stronger public health care is the firm belief on the values that served to create our medicare system -- the values of equity and egalitarianism. If we can’t be equal when we are sick then where are we equal? These words need to mean more than political talking-points. We made a pledge over 50 years ago that no Canadian would ever die or go bankrupt because they can’t afford health care.