Yes, the federal government is spending money. I also don't mean to say they're not. In April, the minister responsible did announce $256 million specifically for the housing partnership initiative, which is a portion of the housing strategy.
I think it's useful to take a look at what percentage of the funding allocation is actually going into capital costs, at how many units are actually being created. You can take an example of where we're having a place open up in Victoria with 45 beds for the absolutely homeless. In actuality, that's only an increase of 16, because it's a rebuild on a place that was smaller. In really looking at those numbers, how much is each one of these units costing us? Maybe there's a more effective way of doing it. And what percentage of the housing partnership initiative funding is going toward programming, as compared to actually putting units in the ground?
Again, I know it's really complex and that there is a lot of overlap and interplay between the provinces and the municipalities. We have examples in the province of B.C. where there's federal money and there's provincial money on the plate, and the municipalities are saying, “Not in my backyard”. Maybe there needs to be a contingency attached to the money that's given by the federal government, so that it has to go to places where there is zoning in place.
In some ways, I do think there is some evaluation to be made of the efficacy of how the money is spent, but I cannot get away from stressing that, in comparison to our neighbours south of the border, we just don't have a big enough plate on the table.