Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Minister, for being here.
I have a couple of questions in particular, so I want to get right to them.
With all due respect, some of my colleagues have suggested during pre-budget consultations that such things as social and green infrastructure don't grow the economy as much as building roads or bridges does. I personally disagree with this. In some instances, social infrastructure such as secure housing can actually have twofold benefits. There's not only the construction of the housing, but we know that secure housing can actually add to secure employment in a lot of instances.
We have also been hearing a lot about an aging workforce, but we also know we haven't a good enough representation of women, as well as indigenous communities, in the workforce. As examples of investments in social infrastructure, I mention housing, or child care spaces, or frankly, clean water in indigenous communities.
Can you perhaps elaborate and speak further to the connection between social infrastructure investments not only being the moral thing, but also growing the economy?