Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Oral health is so important. We all know that. I know that. I recently had a filling that went bad, and it was not good. It was painful, but I won't get into the details of that.
I'm lucky that I have access to any number of dentists in Ottawa and Toronto. I have a good insurance plan. But we know, and it is especially important, that there are many communities and many individuals in this country who are disadvantaged and marginalized and do not have access to proper services. That is why it's so important for us to ensure that indigenous children, in particular, have proper oral health.
It's no secret that the oral health of Inuit and first nation children is especially poor. I heard the Auditor General say very clearly in his earlier remarks on the work of the department that it was not focusing on closing the gap. What we need to do is very much remember that there is a gap, and it is our responsibility to close that gap, because there are children who do not have access to these services.
Oral health is so important, because it's linked to general health outcomes. It's linked to their ability to receive a proper education. It's linked to their personal sense of well-being and confidence. When there is poor oral health, there are poor outcomes for children.
In the Auditor General's report on page 3, paragraph 4.9, it states that $5.4 million was allocated by the federal government in 2014-15 for the children's oral health initiative, but in 2016, Health Canada found that only 238 out of 452 eligible communities received services.
Of course, I'm going to go to the negative and ask, why didn't 214 communities receive any services? Why was that the case?