Welcome, Minister, to the committee. Congratulations on your inaugural appearance.
Minister, I'm looking at the youth employment strategy in the 2013-14 departmental performance report. I want to ask about youth unemployment in this country, which you touched on. As you know, it's approximately twice the national average, about 14%. Some think it's higher than that, because that's just the reported number. We know that young people are hurting, and parents are worried, yet there was lapsed spending. Forty million dollars that were targeted to go towards alleviating youth unemployment did not go towards helping Canada's young people find jobs last year. On top of that, there are now cuts planned to the youth employment strategy, nearly $20 million, by 2018. Further, we note that dozens of organizations waited months to hear about skills link funding the government either did not dole out or doled out very late.
Minister, in the face of a 14% youth unemployment rate, why did you leave $40 million unspent to address this issue, and why will there be future cuts?