Strengthened by the agreements it has just signed with five healthy provinces, the Trudeau government believes it will soon be able to do the same with Quebec.
Minister Dominic LeBlanc said he was confident, Thursday, to see Quebec added “soon” to the list of provinces that have concluded bilateral agreements on health transfers.
Mr. LeBlanc and his colleague Minister of Health, Jean-Yves Duclos, had just had discussions on health transfers with two ministers of the Legault government – Eric Girard (Finance) and Jean-François Roberge (Canadian Relations).
All that remains is for the Government of Quebec to send a “letter recognizing an agreement in principle”, specified Mr. Duclos.
According to the two federal ministers, the negotiation with the government of Quebec would not be more complex than with the others. On the contrary, since Quebec is “ahead” of the others in terms of data production, noted Mr. Duclos.
Dominic LeBlanc even said he found that the provinces — including Quebec — “had a lot in common”.
It was the last stop in their tour of provincial capitals to conclude bilateral agreements concerning federal transfers totaling $46 billion in new money over ten years, promised by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to fund health services.
The tour of ministers Duclos and LeBlanc has already led to agreements in principle with Ontario and four Atlantic provinces.
For now, ministers Girard and Roberge have not commented on their meeting with federal ministers.
In a statement released Thursday morning, the federal government first announced that it had reached an agreement with the Ontario government worth $74 billion over 10 years, including $8.4 billion in the framework of the bilateral agreement.
The agreement with Ontario also provides for an additional federal payment of $776 million, through the Canada Health Transfer, “to meet urgent needs”, particularly in pediatric hospitals and emergency rooms, as well as to long wait times for surgeries.
With The Canadian Press