Thank you very much.
Our committee, as the chair mentioned, has done some travelling. We're happy to be here today to hear the experience of those who are working with people who are living in poverty. We hope to hear from people who are living in poverty as we continue. We've had some of that.
It's a very powerful message from both of you.
I'd like to start, Kate, if I could, with you. I like what you said: it's your obligation to serve the person who is at the door. It's not to look for the poor but to serve the person who is at the door. We sometimes have this idea that we have to determine who the deserving poor are. I would think that people who show up at Maryhouse or people who show up at the Victoria Faulkner Women's Centre aren't there because they have a lot of options and a lot of alternatives. We really don't need to determine who's poor, right?
We had a member of Parliament this week, from my own province—and we're not being televised or anything, so I'm not trying to pick on this particular person--who referred to people in Halifax as no-good people living on the street. There is still a view among some people that not everybody who's living in those conditions should be. But everybody is a human being.
It seems to me that anybody who would show up at Maryhouse or at the Victoria Faulkner Women's Centre needs help. And it's not your job to.... I appreciate that point of view. You serve people who come looking for help.