Mr. Speaker, I too will be supporting the motion. I find the transfer of the public housing program to the Department of Education…. I don’t believe it was well thought out, and it was something I think has a good theoretical application but doesn’t apply practically. I think there’s enough work done on this side. It was felt the theory was that it would be an easy, smooth transfer over, and that all of the subsidies were going to try to be under one umbrella, and that they were going to attempt to have one-stop shopping for the tenants in the public housing.
As it turns out, it has complicated the lives of the people in public housing, definitely in Tu Nedhe. I find there is almost 50 per cent of the people in Tu Nedhe live in public housing. There’s an additional problem that I had seen with this transfer initially. There is, because as high as 65 per cent of some of the population in some of the communities live in public housing, there is not a stigma attached to living in public housing, as there is to have to go to the government for income support. Therefore, what this transfer has, in effect, done is taken all the people currently in public housing, all 2,000-plus families in public housing, and has essentially transferred them over to being income support clients.
I’m supporting the motion. Hopefully, the government will see that this was a mistake. I know, certainly, the people in the Tu Nedhe and even the workers in Tu Nedhe recognize that this is a mistake. They’ve worked with it, and they don’t feel it is something that is going to be successful. They don’t feel it’s something that is going to benefit the tenants in public housing. Thank you.