Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As the seconder of the motion, I, too, will be supporting the motion.
Again, I think it’s something that we have to be aware of. Jurisdiction to the west in regard to the Yukon, they do use the 25 percent income threshold and I think it’s something that we should be seriously considering to have a similar type of economic arrangement where we have a large urban centre, but also we have a lot of remote communities.
I think, Mr. Speaker, it’s important to realize that what we’re finding, through statistics and also through poverty studies, that there are communities where we have some 45 percent of incomes under
$30,000 of the households in our communities. I think that looking at the amount of income people do derive in a lot of our communities, in most cases that income has to get you through the whole year. Also, with seasonal employment we do have where most people’s earnings take place usually during the summer construction season, somewhere between three and four months. Again, whatever income you derive during that period of time has to get you through the remaining seven or eight months, depending on how long you’re able to be employed.
Mr. Speaker, I think it’s critical that we do everything we can to support our individual communities. More importantly, we talk about a diverse economy and taking advantage of our economies, but we have to be able to give people the means to sustain themselves and take advantage of those economic opportunities.
Mr. Speaker, again, I will be supporting the motion. Thank you.