Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague across the way for her remarks. I want to focus on one point because time is limited.
The women's march talked about the lack of housing as being a major cause and perhaps the effect of poverty among women. Today on the Hill there was another related event. The Canadian Association of Food Banks held a news conference to talk about two studies it had released. There are now 707 food banks in Canada and 726,000 people using those food banks, which is an increase in the last year. Many of those people live in very poor housing. That is one of the problems.
It talked about the fact that while we have a minister for homelessness in Canada, we have a lack of a national housing strategy. I am now paraphrasing from the remarks in the study this morning. It also indicated that the minister in charge of CMHC announced further research and consultation but that that was really not what we needed. We need funds committed to a national strategy and targets for the creation of affordable housing. So there is a link between poverty, particularly women's poverty and the lack of affordable housing.
I wonder if my colleague could tell me how we might attack this problem? There has been a retraction by the federal government on this issue. I wonder if she could tell us how we might get ourselves into a position where we have a decent strategy for housing?