-__ , g ThursdayLMarch 77L1968

Now we come to Medicare and it looks as thou h ‘ ‘ ‘ g now smce the M Health has made an announcement that we will have no Medicare in thislrf’lsgii‘ngg

by July the first. We have 57.867. of the o ulation I th' k ' and apparently nothing has been cdone. p p , m he said, now covered

We had hoped that after prolonging this for an extra ear that ' would be taken and this special Committee appointed would yrepotr fasgiriri‘zbfitl’g: wards Medicare. We find now that two of the provinces of Canada, Saskatchewan and British Columbia Wlll enter the plan, and we in Prince Edward Island along

with the other Provinces will be paying our share in income tax toward ing out of this program in these two rich provinces. S the carry-

The former government realized that Medicare was coming into effe . t - Ct tually, that we wanted to give medical servxces to the elderly people of our 613:2: ince as a stop gap until such time as Medicare was brought into effect. So we made arrangements With the Blue Cross - Blue Shield to cover our elderly people at that

time at a cost of $31.00 per person, and we covered all those that had bee ' ' Old Age Assistance from 65 to 70. We covered all those that were recreiviiig‘wag Age Security over the age of seventy, and we covered those that were receiving disability, blind, mother’s allowances, and other social assistance. But what do we find now, we find that those people that are receiving Old Age Security have been turned down right and left, because that the government claims that these were never to be included. But we never turned anyone down that required this that needed it, and I think if the government are not going to put in Medicare program along with some of the other provinces that surely all the Old Age Pensioners should be covered, the disabled, and the others who are receiving assistance from this Prov- ince. (Applause)

I think this plan is working all right. If my information is right we received a rebate on the $31.00 that we had overpaid. I am not sure of that — somebody mentioned there was a rebate came in. It should cover anyone over 65 years of age because these people cannot get any other plan, and we know with the cost of living today that the amount of money these people are getting from their pen— sions is not sufficient.

I hope the government will operate a plan to at least these people in for now and possibly later on they can inaugurate some plan to take in all these low-wage earners in this Province.

I saw in the paper the other day that the net debt of this province was $84,579. Hon. T. Earle Hickey: $84,000,000.

Henry W. \Vedge: Oh that is wrong. I will have to add more to it. I took this out of the paper. They call this the net debt. It seems to me when an external audit

was taken after the former government went out of power, which is the usual pro- cedure, it seems to me the net debt was $49,000,000.

Several Members: OHHHHHHHH!

Hon. Cecil Miller: Where did you read that?

Henry W. Wedge: There was another figure that was mentioned, of $60,000,000. Hon. Cecil A. Miller: $99,000,000.

Henry W. Wedge: This is wrong then, this is not the net debt?

Hon. T. Earle Hickey: No it is not the net debt, it is the gross debt.

Henry W. Wedge: It is the gross debt? Well, regardless of that it looks as though the government has gone in debt nineteen or twenty million dollars over the last year. (Laughter) Now I cannot understand how they would do that because they got four, or five, or six extra millions of dollars from the Federal Government, some- thing we never got before, and they still go in the red nineteen million dollars. Now what have we got to show for it? We were criticized for running up the debt to forty, fifty, sixty million or whatever... .

Hon. Cecil A. Miller: Seventy, eighty, ninety, ninety-nine.

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