Thank you so much.
I'm here, obviously, to represent the ONE campaign and women and girls globally.
Honourable members, did you know that 2.7 million infants die every year at birth? Did you know that adolescent girls account for 74% of all new HIV infections? Did you know that, today alone, 800 children will die of malaria? That's 800 children who will die today.
These stats are startling, but there's hope, and Canada can be a part of it. In 2015, 2016 and 2017 your very committee moved forward with recommendations to increase Canada's international assistance and establish a path to investing 0.7% of Canada's GNI in official development assistance by 2030.
I'm here today to call on the Government of Canada to act on these recommendations, please, by finally increasing Canada's spending on global development and humanitarian assistance over 10 years through predictable 15% annual increases to the international assistance envelope starting in the fiscal year of 2019.
We can do this. If each Canadian spent an extra $17 a year, we could generate and close gaps that add up to about $28 trillion. When we empower women and girls with education, when we increase our international aid and those women and girls can go to school, we're activating brain power. The planet's in dire straits; we know this. When we activate those young, vibrant brains alone.... These girls, 130 million, are not allowed to go to school. For a lot of them, they cannot afford a $6 uniform. Their families cannot afford this.
Through our international development and through increasing what we put into international development, just small increments, we can have incredible global impact.
I'm here to ask you to please reconsider the past three years in the recommendations. The recommendations of this very Standing Committee on Finance, three years in a row and then echoed again last year in 2018 at the G7's Gender Equality Advisory Council, have been held close by our government.
Let's see something happen with this, please.
Thank you.