Mr. Speaker, in early February the principal of a school in Iqaluit, Nunavut, sent a letter to the editor of an Ottawa daily newspaper describing the urgent need of books for his school.
After speaking to him, and to my colleague from Nunavut, we launched a book drive with hopes of collecting 100 or 200 boxes. To our surprise, we ended up with more than 1,000 boxes, in excess of 25,000 books.
I would like to thank everyone in the region who contributed, particularly one young lady, Catherine French, who collected over 2,000 all by herself.
I would like to thank the people of Mattawa, the village where I was born, the people at F.J. McGellight Secondary School, St. Victor's and St. Anne's schools and the municipal library, for contributing more than 200 boxes of books.
I also wish to thank Susan Scullion of my colleague from Nunavut's office, and Suzanne Demers of my own, without whom this project could not have been the success that it was.