Mr. Speaker, as the member confirmed, the items he was talking about are items that are very important to the government as evidenced by the programs that it has put forward. I am delighted with the chance to talk about some of the progress.
There is no one in the House who would not like to eliminate child poverty. As long as there is one child in poverty we are all going to work toward removing that and we have different solutions. There has been some progress. It was at 16.7% in 1996. It was reduced to 11.4% in 2001.
How did some of the improvements and reduction in child poverty occur? It was the national child benefit, which was the most important social program in history since medicare. Based on its successes so far in reducing child poverty, the government added another $965 million so that by 2007 it will be a $10 billion program. It keeps over 50,000 children a year out of poverty.
Since 1999 there has been $753 million put toward homelessness and in 2003 another $405 million was put in over three years. There was $1 billion in total for affordable housing. It started out at $680 million and in 2003 there was another $320 million added. We are moving on some exciting projects in my riding on that.
We also put money into renovations, a program for low income people and seniors. That is very popular in my riding and very helpful for those most in need for housing. It will be between $1 billion to $1.5 billion over the next five years. Once again, it is another program that helps the poorest of the poor, especially in the housing area. Child care will help single mothers go to work and help reduce child poverty.
In total, there is $11 billion a year that goes toward children. We must continue to increase that as our resources become available through our prudent fiscal management and move in the direction that I am sure that everyone in the House would like us to move.