Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to what the hon. member had to say. I know she has done lots of work as the chair of the Liberal task force on urban affairs. I am glad to hear her talk about the need for a permanent affordable housing program in this country. I am glad to hear her speak about the need for infrastructure funding for our municipalities and for public transit funding.
The concern I have is that, although I have heard this many times before from the task force, from individual government members and even from ministers, it never translates into the kind of funding stability on which our municipalities can rely.
One of the problems is that there is no minister who is actually responsible for urban affairs. It is scattered all over the place, partly through infrastructure, through crown corporations, through housing and so on. If this is seen as an issue where the federal government needs to take leadership in working with the provinces to provide the funds, then it seems to me that there needs to be a minister who has clear responsibility and a mandate for urban affairs, because 80% of Canadians live in the urban environment.
I wonder if the hon. member would comment on whether she would agree with that and whether she would agree with funding for public transit. One of the things that is really an outrage is the amount of money that the federal government takes out of gasoline taxes and does not put back into funding public transit. In my own city of Vancouver we have had terrible problems with financing public transit because so much money is going out in gasoline tax and is not coming back into the local community. I wonder if the member would comment on those two things.