Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As Members are aware, I was absent from this House on Wednesday, June 17, and Thursday, June 18, for the purpose of a meeting in Ottawa with the Hon. Elmer MacKay, Minister responsible for CMHC. Last February, the federal government announced that the federal funding for social housing in Canada was being reduced. Although the first indication was that only the rate of growth was being reduced, the true impact became evident later when all provinces and territories were advised that the provision of new housing units would have to be reduced substantially and that most of the available funding must go toward operating and maintaining existing housing in Canada. The impact on the NWT would be to reduce the number of new units we could provide by 59 per cent for the 1993-94 construction year.
As we still have a major shortfall of housing in the NWT, of approximately 3100 units, the effect of these reductions would be to eliminate the possibility of providing adequate, reasonable and affordable housing to NWT residents for the foreseeable future. As this clearly is not an acceptable situation, we have been working extensively with both the federal government and the provinces to restore funding to the 1991-92 levels.
In my recent meeting with Elmer MacKay, I was able to present to him the facts of our unique circumstances in the NWT that would justify and support the restoring of the funding levels. I am pleased to advise you that Mr. MacKay understood our needs and our unique circumstances. He indicated his intention to work with his colleagues, the Hon. Tom Siddon, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, and the Minister of Finance, the Hon. Don Mazankowski, to pursue ways and means of allocating significant federal funding for northern housing.
I will be meeting with the Hon. Elmer MacKay and the provincial and territorial Ministers of Housing on June 29 to address the planned federal funding reductions. I will report further progress to the House and to the standing committee on finance in early July following the ministerial meeting at the end of June. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.