Thank you.
You made mention, Madam Minister, of the adult literacy rate being 52% and of working on improving the governance of the country. I think it had been identified throughout the election period, and from many people we talked to...there's a real need across the country for the people to understand their parliamentarians and senators--what role they would play and how they would interact with municipal governing--and for the average citizen to be able to embrace and be more enthusiastic, I suppose, about the election of their members of Parliament and senators. Perhaps that's one of the reasons it was a 30% turnout.
If more funding is being put into improving the governance and going down this road, one of the major ways this could be accomplished--once again, in the very long term--is of course through the schools. This would obviously be the best approach to the literacy challenge.
We were noticing when we were there that the schools, practically to a school, were dull and dark and dingy, and the chalkboards in them so used and worn out that hardly any markings were able to be put on them any more.
Is there any consideration being given to working with international cooperative people, one, to improve the conditions in the classroom, and two, to develop a model that would be introduced with our governance method through the school system as an educational unit that could be taught on an annual basis, and looking 10 or 15 years down the road, to have that literacy rate--a rate of understanding of the governance level at least--be much higher?