Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to our witnesses. I apologize for coming late. I had an overlapping committee.
I appreciate all the work that all your organizations do. Mr. Quist, and MCC I'm very familiar with, as well as the United Way. I had the honour of being our workplace chair prior to my life in politics. They do great work in the community, and with all the volunteers as well.
We've heard from numerous witnesses over the last several months while the committee has been studying this important issue of poverty. We know it's a non-partisan issue. It affects all of us across the country, in every corner and every nook and cranny across the nation.
I represent an area in the Okanagan. The Kelowna Lake country has a high demographic of seniors, and the aspect of income splitting for seniors was very well received. I understand the fact, which Mr. Quist alluded to, that you need a multi-pronged approach.
Regarding the delivery of services, we're finding a lot of the social issues are at the provincial level, from a constitutional perspective. We have the social transfer of 3%, which was alluded to by my colleague Mr. Lobb, until 2014, so it's escalating each year. But there are really no conditions attached to that transfer of funding, and we can't really go back because of the agreement. So I wonder if maybe we could go across the panel and get some suggestions for the committee for additional funding to be provided to the provinces as we move forward. How can we provide some benchmark stipulations so there's some accountability for the funds as they're earmarked for housing and specific projects and for social issues in the community? Even child care is a provincial jurisdiction. We give them money and we can't force them to deliver there.
I look forward to your expertise on working with the provinces on how we could have that “conditional love” attached, if we can put it that way.
We haven't heard from Ms. Potvin. Do you have any words of advice from your experience? Welcome.