Alexa McDonough promises to fix the health care system by increasing federal funding for medicare.

Claiming that the federal Liberals have starved the health care system and opened the door to privatization, New Democratic Party Leader Alexa McDonough is promising to stop the growth of two-tier medicine by increasing federal funding for medicare.

"Every Canadian deserves high quality health care, no matter where they live or how much money they have," said McDonough. "Unlike the Liberals or the Alliance, New Democrats believe that for all Canadians to have quality health care the federal government has to set and keep national standards."

If elected, the NDP promises to amend the Canada Health Act to withhold federal funding from provinces that allow private for-profit clinics to provide insured health care services. The party would introduce a national prescription drug program that would cost $2.4 billion and pay for drugs for patients recovering at home after a hospital stay, or for those with chronic illnesses without a private drug plan.

The health package also includes more than $1.2 billion a year to establish a national home care program to support families caring for sick relatives.

On post-secondary education, the NDP is promising to make a college and university education more accessible by replacing the Millennium Scholarship Fund with a needs-based grants program, negotiating with the provinces to freeze and roll back tuition fees, and making the Canada Student Loans Program interest-free during the life of the loan. The NDP is also proposing to credit all interest paid on student loans since 1995 and to deny federal funding for private, for-profit universities.

CAUT president Tom Booth said the NDP's proposals on improving access to post-secondary education are positive, but that there is little detail as to how they would increase funding to universities and colleges.

"It's not clear how the NDP plan would ensure that badly needed dollars are delivered to our institutions," he said. "The problem we see with rising tuition fees and diminished accessibility is really a symptom of a far deeper problem -- the lack of core funding."

Other highlights of the NDP platform include: a national job training fund, a national child care program, a national housing strategy to combat homelessness and build affordable non-profit units, a $900 million increase in foreign aid, and, $4 billion for environmental programs.

The NDP would cancel the Liberal's tax cuts announced in the fall mini-budget and instead provide a full rebate for all those earning less than $15,000 a year, a move the party says would provide $800 more to low income earners than under Finance Minister Paul Martin's plan. The party would also double the child tax benefit and impose an excess profits tax on the banks.

In unveiling her party's platform, McDonough said the economic policies of the Alliance "are hateful in terms of how they impact on individuals and whole communities," but that the way the Liberals are adopting the same policies is even "scarier."