Mr. Speaker, I will touch first on the aspect of the racialization of poverty.
Throughout our history aboriginal people within Canada have always been the most impoverished. That continues to be the case. They do not have the economic opportunities that others have. For decades they did not have an opportunity for education as a direct result of government policy. The lack of educational opportunity directly correlates with the problem of not being directly involved in economic opportunities. It is getting better but there is a long way to go.
What we have seen happening in the last five to 10 years is that an increasing number of immigrants who come to Canada are finding themselves at the poverty level. At one time when they came to Canada they would be able to work and move up into the higher wage brackets but those jobs are not available anymore. Part of the reason is there has been a push within our country to not have well paying jobs, to destabilize union workforces and to push immigrants into low paying jobs by saying that if they did not do those jobs, the company would move out and no jobs would be available. That is the kind of attitude out there.
At one time Canada was a great place for immigrants to come and make a good, strong living and to be active partners in our system. What we are seeing now is an impoverished immigrant community. It is going to create hard feelings between people. That is not the way it should be. Canada should be a place where people can come to improve their lifestyle. That is what most of them come here to do.
With regard to the Prime Minister's and the health minister's fooling around with whether or not they support not for profit health care, I think that the health minister let the cat out of the bag before the election. He had his hands slapped, was raked over the coals, and is now trying to backtrack.
The reality is that the Liberal government is doing just as the Conservative Party wants it to do. It is going to support for profit, private health care. That means the government will use taxpayer dollars to pay private companies for health care. That is not economically sound.
I received an e-mail from a fellow in Alberta. Heaven help us, there was someone in Alberta who said that one does not have to be an economist to know that wholesale is cheaper than retail. Why would the government waste taxpayers' dollars to pay for profit companies when we can have a publicly provided service?