Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to try to understand some of my colleagues' concerns over Community Empowerment.
Over the past number of years, this Government, in one form or another, has supported the idea of government services, the best job of the people within the communities. It is the community organization and community leaders that have the best knowledge of the residents and how best to service them. This initiative has been called many different things over the past years.
The one window approach is one of the first recently with the previous government, it was called community transfers, and now it is called community empowerment. Each initiative has its own good points and bad points. But as a whole, communities have the benefit, benefit considerably from this type of devolution.
As this Government has evolved and has become more responsible for its finances, so have the communities. They understand what is required to take on more responsibility and if the community can demonstrate their expertise, knowledge and their willingness to take on extra duties, then we should be encouraging them, not chastising, this from some of my colleagues.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, I encourage all communities to investigate areas that they feel comfortable in taking control. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.