Mr. Speaker, a few weeks from now, thousands of Quebeckers will be moving to a new home. But this year as last year, many families in Montreal, Quebec City, Gatineau and elsewhere will find themselves without housing, on the street.
Between 1994 and 2002, the federal government deprived inadequately housed Quebeckers of approximately 40,000 units of social housing.
This government must be reminded that nearly 1 million Quebeckers are inadequately housed, either spending too high a portion of their income on housing or living in substandard and often unsanitary housing. Statistics Canada reports that in 2001, nearly 218,500 households in Quebec were spending some 50% of their income on rent.
At present, hundreds of families and individuals are already homeless, the vast majority being too poor to afford housing.
In the face of the worsening crisis, the Bloc Quebecois asks that the federal government urgently make funding available for social housing.