Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I counted more than three questions, and I must admit that I did not fully understand all of them. I will try, nonetheless, to answer as many as possible.
We're proud of the work that we've done on affordable housing and homelessness: on and off reserve, for seniors, for the disabled, and for families in need, quite frankly.
You asked about homelessness. We signed a homelessness partnership agreement strategy with the provinces. After all, they're the ones closest to the ground; they know where the real needs are.
Because of the nature of homelessness, it's almost impossible to determine how many people really are homeless. I don't mean to sound facetious in the least when I say that you can't go out and do an enumeration of them like you might for an election: they don't have a door to answer when you knock on it, unfortunately.
So we have estimates, but those estimates are as broad as they are long. What we do know is that unfortunately there are people who are homeless. That's why, with the new homeless partnering strategy, we changed it in two fundamental ways.
We recognize that homelessness isn't just an urban problem. The previous program was focused on specific communities across the country. We also opened it up to rural areas like my own Haldimand—Norfolk, where the numbers may not be large but the effects of homelessness are just as serious for those who are going through it.
The other thing we did with some of the funds was to make sure we were addressing the mental illness needs of the homeless, which are pervasive. We considered this to be a big improvement.
We provide funding through CHMC for affordable housing and housing programs on reserve. We also provide funding off reserve.
Our economic action plan included $2 billion that was broken out with specific funding for seniors, for the north, for aboriginals, for the disabled, for the renovation of existing affordable housing, and for the construction of new affordable housing.
As for having funding left over for specific projects, that would go to the administration of those programs. Quite often, there is a situation wherein people have been in negotiations for a particular project and negotiations have been delayed, so the start has been delayed. We carry money over from one year to the next because we want to make sure the projects get completed.
I'm sorry, but I do not understand your references to the million dollars not spent and the billion dollars overspent.