NEUROTIC NORTHERNERS

The Supreme Court decision that will change Canada (Mark Kennedy, The Ottawa Citizen, June 10th, 2005)

Canada's top court has looked into the eyes of the country's political leaders and called their bluff. For more than a decade, prime ministers and premiers have boasted about how medicare is the best health care system in the world. In election after election, they have pledged to make it even better.

But in a split decision yesterday, the justices of the Supreme Court of Canada exposed that rhetoric for what it plainly is: A lie, a shallow promise, a political tactic employed by the federal Liberals to gain, and retain, the keys to government.

The judgment is truly historic and will transform this country's health system in ways that we still do not comprehend. But this much is clear: Some of the judges were unwilling to let governments twiddle their thumbs any longer, while countless Canadians suffer and die while on lengthy wait lists for medical treatment.

Three of the judges wrote it was best for the court to stay out of a political debate that has been raging in this country for years. But four others clearly did not. Justice Marie Deschamps was the most blunt:

"This is not a case in which the court must show deference to the government's choice of measure," she wrote. "The courts have a duty to rise above political debate. ... Inertia cannot be used as an argument to justify deference.[...]

The case was brought to the high court by Dr. Jacques Chaoulli and George Zeliotis, a 74-year-old Montreal businessman who contended he waited too long for his hip surgery in the mid-'90s. They said the waiting lists in the publicly funded system have become so long that they violate the Charter of Rights' guarantee of life, liberty and security of the person. Instead, people should have the right to buy private health insurance and pay for private care rather than waiting in the public queue, they contended.

Others told the court a private insurance system would endanger the public system by draining medical talent and public support away from medicare. It was an argument three of the judges accepted.

But Judge Deschamps and three others -- Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, Justice John Major, and Justice Michel Bastarache -- concluded those fears are groundless. In their opinion, Chief Justice McLachlin, Judge Major and Judge Bastarache were biting in their criticism of the warning about private insurance that is repeatedly espoused by the federal government.

They wrote that other western democracies have private insurance systems without harming the public health systems.

"When we look to the evidence, rather than to assumptions, the connection between prohibiting private insurance and maintaining quality public health care vanishes."

It is hard to believe it was just a few months ago that the winner of a much publicized CBC contest to select the greatest Canadian ever was the socialist founder of medicare.