Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has asked a very good question and a very important one. I believe that food banks are being used today at unprecedented rates, not only in Newfoundland but in a lot of Atlantic Canada.
I was part of a committee on poverty that travelled this country from Newfoundland to Vancouver. We held public meetings and had people come forward and make presentations. One of the things people said to us consistently was that the unemployment insurance system and the changes that the federal government made to the unemployment insurance system had lowered their income levels to such an extent that they depended on food banks on an almost weekly basis. The government should be held to account for that.