Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), this is a study of the federal contribution to reducing poverty in Canada.
I want to start off by saying that I'm sorry I'm a little bit late.
Thank you to the departmental officials from HRSDC and Statistics Canada for coming, once again, on relatively short notice. We thank you for coming back. As you know, we've been studying poverty, and we've decided in this Parliament to go ahead with it again, so we want to get members up to speed. Once again, we thank you for coming and for making time in your schedules.
We understand that both of you have approximately 10 to 15 minutes each, so we'll go ahead right away. I'll stop my talking. And of course the members then will ask some questions. Hopefully there won't be too many comments. There will mostly be questions, but you never know with this group. We'll find out what happens.
Who would like to go first?
All right, Frank Fedyk from HRSDC, the floor is yours, sir.