Thank you, Chair.
I certainly want to thank all of the witnesses for coming here today and talking to us about the work that's being done.
I would be remiss if I didn't single you out, Dr. Kirby, for the work you have done in health and health care in this country and the work you did in the Senate. If anybody doubted that the Senate served a useful function in Canada, you are a shining example of what kind of work can be done. The work you've done both in public life and in private life has been very important. As a Nova Scotian, I would expect nothing less of you, as somebody who has spent most of his public life in Nova Scotia.
I can honestly say that in the work I do in poverty and with mental health groups in my area there are people who I think have your picture on the wall now. You wouldn't overstate the impact of the work you've done, but to people who have been in the shadows for so many years, it's very significant. Congratulations for that.
I'd like to talk a little about something you touched on, which is what I refer to as the social infrastructure of Canada. It seems to me that a lot of the social infrastructure that we have to protect, and also the enhanced opportunities for people, whether it's employment insurance or other programs, are not very well designed for people who have mental illness.
If you break your arm, you know what to do. You get it fixed and you know when it's fixed that you go back to work. I wonder if you, or any of you, have any thoughts on that specifically, and also on what we could do. Should there be a special social infrastructure that takes people with mental illness and deals with them entirely separately, for example? Or should we modify some of the programs we have to deal with people who are either in poverty or headed towards poverty and who don't have the kind of support they need?