That's a great question, because New Brunswick would be considered a province in which 50% of the population is rural.
There is a tension between strong national support programs and the flexibility that could be engaged and enjoyed if you were to target resources. Coming from a smaller community, maybe you can appreciate that it's a question of scale, which is often very difficult. Saint John now has 68,000 people, and we experience all the social ills of any major metropolitan area. It's a question of how we can create and develop the capacity to deal with that. We have a needle exchange, a men's shelter, and a women's shelter. These are all fragile pieces of infrastructure that we're trying to sustain.
It seems to me that a principal barrier when you're talking about rural populations is transportation. I know there are many in this group who have worked to overcome that and to deal with it. It's a huge barrier and an impediment to participation, to belonging, to getting access to services.
Per capita funding allocations don't often serve us well. New Brunswick now, according to yesterday's census data, has 2.1% of the national population and 10 federal seats. It is a question of relevance, of access, of political power, and of what per capita funding allocations do. We need to have some flexibility at the local level. I think differential funding formulas are something that this community has advanced over the years, and I think there's a compelling case for doing that. A central city elementary school trying to fundraise and to develop the range of services that you would expect in a public school is far different in downtown Saint John than it would be if it were in one of the suburban municipalities or even one of the rural areas that surround it.
It's an excellent question. I don't have an easy answer. I think there's a combination of a strong national program.... I spoke about pharmacare, and I think there are 70,000 families in New Brunswick that are uninsured. I think it's going to have to be one of those combinations.