Mr. Speaker, the issue I raised today in my Member’s statement has a serious impact on the people who live and work in downtown Yellowknife. It causes many people great concern. The fact of the lack of public washrooms causes people to do natural things in unnatural places, if I may say. You know, that is not supporting dignity and humanity in the nicest of ways.
I know it’s far too easy to make jokes about this, and it is probably not uncommon to want to make jokes about something like this, but this is a serious issue. The people in the downtown riding want to move out of downtown. People don’t want to do business downtown, and it’s because of things like this.
My question will be to the Minister of Health and Social Services. Is she willing to look into this problem and see if it can be addressed by possibly finding some NGO or some service organization that will open up a facility so people who are homeless or who are in need can go to a pubic washroom without having to beg for a key or kick a
door in to try to get into a facility when they need to use one?