Jack Layton - the health care hypocrite

One of the most often recurring themes we hear out of NDP leader Jack Layton is the fact that he does not support private health care in Canada. Layton is on record as saying that he or his wife would never use a private clinic to jump the line for surgery.

Except of course that he already did...

In documents found today, it was found that Mr Layton had hernia surgery at the Shouldice Hospital, a private facility in the Toronto suburb of Thornhill, while he was serving as a Toronto city councillor.

Layton defended himself with

"It's just part of the system, The doctor says, 'Go there.' You pay with your (Ontario health) card. It never occurred to me (it was) anything other than medicare, which it is.

Of course, Layton does have the defense that the facility was non-profit, it was set up for veterans coming in from WWII and he did pay with his Health Card. I do not, however, buy into the excuse that he did not know, he openly admitted it was public knowledge that the facility was private.

Some private health care facilities are not an evil thing, I'm not saying that choosing a private clinic was a bad thing. Mr Layton just needs to watch it when he uses the word "never" as histories are not hard to check.