There are obviously a lot of aspects to your question. I'd like to talk about Quebec's legislation. I was in the assembly when it was passed. I was proud to be there. I also remember the pride of all parliamentarians, regardless of party, in voting unanimously in favour of such an act. It was magical. They didn't achieve it alone. It was a broad popular movement that resulted in that decision and made things happen. Members were paying attention, which is very important. They agreed to listen and did not close teh assembly's doors when the petition was introduced.
You talked about impacts and organizations. Government funding is often program funding in an attempt to measure the program's impact. I understand why. It's because governments want very specific accountability. Investing in people and investing in a community are not measured in the same way as investing in a business. You don't measure that based on performance, the number of customers or benefits that can be distributed to shareholders. There's an expression in English: trust the process. That means that you have to let the communities act, invest and use that money well. It's not program funding that we need. The machinery of the government has a lot of trouble understanding that.
Across the country, the United Way has changed its practices in the past 10 years or so. We are totally committed to comprehensive funding of the organization, to core funding. We are the only ones. Even some private foundations are proceeding through program funding. We have to get out of this context. We have to mobilize communities, help them in an overall sense and subsequently assess the impact. That's the only answer I can give you.
Large companies that make donations to the United Way ask what impact that has had on the community. I tell them what we've done with the money, how we've mobilized the community and the number of services we've put in place. Someone one day dared to ask me if we had any poverty reduction targets. The answer is no; donors aren't there for that. The federal government gave itself 25 years and wasn't even able to achieve it and didn't follow it appropriately. So how can we ask charities to do that kind of tracking in the community? Who do those people take us for? They give us money so that services can be provided, so that people can get back their dignity and so that communities can vitalize. We do that and we give them figures, but they ask us to set impact objectives like you ask university institutions, private businesses and other institutions. You have to be careful. The third sector is full of people of good will who know what to do and who know their community. Let them work and don't exhaust them with impact measures that will deter them from what they really have to do.
That's a trap, and that's the best answer I can give to all your questions, Ms. Beaudin.