Mr. Speaker, it has already been five years since the United Nations designated 1990 as the international year of literacy. It is the UN's goal to liberate nearly a quarter of the world's population from the bonds of illiteracy by the year 2000 and much of this work starts at home.
It is estimated that 1.2 million adults in Ontario are functionally illiterate. In my own riding of Parkdale-High Park, librarian Rita Cox and the Parkdale Project Read are beating the odds. Just ask two of Project Read's recent graduates, Jerry Lee Miller and Ed Anable. They are individual success stories and are shining examples that together we can break the cycle of illiteracy.
I congratulate the minister responsible for literacy for doing an excellent job in this field.