Bill No. 88 - Auditor General Act. - Second Reading

CLAUDIA CHENDER: Mr. Speaker, I'll take the last few minutes we have left on this important topic just to say that whether it is a health outcomes auditor, whether it is some other form of accountability, I believe that what we're talking about right now is the fact that we need answers to what is going on in our health care system.

I stood up this morning and I asked about the Dartmouth General Hospital, a hospital that serves 130,000 people. There are five or six MLAs or more, depending on closures, who are sending their constituents to the Dartmouth General Hospital and the Dartmouth General Hospital is maxed out - it is stressed, the ERs are overloaded, the operating theatres are full, the family lounges are full of patients.

It has been six years. Not only do all Nova Scotians not have a family doctor, we have a huge primary care issue. It's growing, Mr. Speaker, it's not getting any better. In the meantime, the Health Committee that has been established.

We don't have the ability as the Opposition, the people who are sent here to ask questions of the government, to set the agenda. The Public Accounts Committee has been scaled back by at least half. What we want, those of us on this side of the House, I believe, and I can be in concert with my colleagues on this one point, are some answers; we want the ability to understand.

Health care is a huge, thorny, expensive, complex system. I don't think any of us think differently, but I believe that all of us want to get to the bottom of it. We want to understand what is going on and we want to be able to solve it for our constituents.

Mr. Speaker, I think the spirit of this bill and the spirit of much of what we've been asking for and pointing to is just that we'd like the ability to ask some questions and get some answers. So, with those few words, I'll take my seat.