Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am totally in support of this motion. I think for me there are two main reasons why I believe that this motion ought to be passed and taken action on. The first one is, I think, respect for our elders and our seniors. I think the fact that we at the moment lump them all together for home maintenance and repair is not a sign of disrespect, but we are not respecting them as we should.

The second issue for me is that I believe, and I believe I’ve heard the government say, that we want to keep our seniors in their homes as much as possible. We want to keep everybody in their homes as long as possible. I think if we have targeted funding for seniors’ home repair and maintenance, as Mr. Beaulieu has stated, their homes will remain habitable a lot longer.

We don’t want to take seniors out of their homes and put them into institutions. We, first of all, don’t have the spaces or institutions where we can put them. Secondly, I don’t think anybody wants to go to an institution until they absolutely have to.

I believe a targeted fund for seniors’ home repair and maintenance is something which will assist us in many ways. It will be more cost efficient than if

we don’t do it. I think it would be relatively easy for the Housing Corporation to determine how many seniors we do currently look after to a certain extent. Take that percentage of the users of the Housing Corporation’s programs, target that percentage of funding to seniors’ home repair and maintenance. It should be a fairly simple thing to do.

The last time that we had seniors programs was in 2005, 2006, and the last numbers that we’ve got indicate that seniors did take up on seniors programs quite a bit. Preventative maintenance in the Sahtu, 60; South Slave, 87; North Slave, 104; Nahendeh, 27; and Beaufort-Delta, 89. Those are large numbers, Mr. Speaker, and I think it indicates that we have seniors who do want to stay in their own home, they do want their home to be comfortable, and they’re willing to look after it but they need some assistance. In my view, targeting funding for seniors particularly will accomplish that goal. I am in support of the motion. I urge my colleagues to be in support also. Thank you.