Elizabeth May requests emergency debate on COVID-19 variants, third wave: “We must do better”

Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands)
2021-04-21 15:27 [p.5928]

Mr. Speaker, I note that you seem to put some emphasis on the word “brief”. I will do my best, but it is an emergency. I think I will find sympathy with many members of the House to the request I bring to the House, but it is only your sympathy that I seek to have an emergency debate this evening on the rising problem of variants of concern.
The fact is that Canada remains at this point and is, as a number of members have just mentioned in question period, in a third wave. An emergency debate should not be a place where we blame each other, but where we take hold of this and ask what we must do better, because we must do better.

I first raised the request for an emergency debate on COVID-19 as it began to change in the second wave in November. My colleague, the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith, asked again in February as the variants appeared to be threatening a third wave. We are now in that third wave.

There are many aspects of this to discuss, but the central question is whether we all, collectively, at different orders of government, need to shift from bending the curve to going to zero COVID to actually working to eliminate COVID from Canada by learning from what the Atlantic provinces are doing and what other provinces did. Can we have an emergency debate on that this evening? It clearly is an emergency.