Thank you, Madam Chair.
I would like to thank Ms. Gabriel for her testimony.
As we begin this study, Ms. Gabriel, I have to say that you have broken the ice. The start of a study is always very exciting because we know we will be welcoming witnesses from all over, each of whom will provide a different point of view.
I am replacing my colleague Marilène Gill at committee today, and I am always pleased to attend.
My riding covers northern Quebec, about 800,000 square kilometres or about half of Quebec. It includes a number of Cree, Inuit and Anishinabe people, as well as various other indigenous communities. In my riding, there are problems relating to food security and the suicide rate in Eeyou Istchee, not to mention climate change, which is resulting in changes to ancestral customs and a lot of isolation.
There are also a lot of transportation problems, both on land and by air. Further, we must not forget the missing and murdered women, and that the calls to action have not yielded much progress.
Indigenous issues are particularly important to my, for the reasons I just stated. Even if there are different issues in your community, remoteness is still a heavy burden in my region, as I said. There are challenges related to construction costs, transportation and materials.
Please tell us about the problems you are experiencing right now that you did not have the opportunity to mention earlier.