Thank you.
Thank you, Mike, for bringing this important legislation forward. You mentioned that your concern and the concern of all parents of autistic kids is, “What's going to happen when I'm gone?”
I think in this position, in Parliament and with this bill, you have a unique opportunity to materially affect that. This legislation will presumably outlive you.
With that in mind, I wanted to ask what the federal government can do in order to ensure that services are maintained for autistic individuals when we know that most health care is a provincial jurisdiction?
As you may or may not know, the Ford government in Ontario has been heavily criticized for drastically cutting services for autistic children. I don't expect or want you to start criticizing Ford and the Ford government, but health care and this kind of funding are generally provincial.
I think you would like to see and ensure that, for example, your child continues to have those services when you're gone. You've been a federal politician for a fair bit.
What can we do, given the jurisdiction issue, to try to ensure that autistic people across Canada continue to have those services?