Madam Speaker, I heard with interest the comments made by the member from the Bloc Québécois and my friend from the government.
I want to correct something because the member from the Bloc is quite mistaken. I want the public to understand that what we have recently done as a government on the issue of aid development is very innovative. What we are doing for the developing world is truly extraordinary and dynamic.
We are focusing the amount of aid on a fixed number of countries. That means the former 100-plus countries we focused on are going to be lowered in number. We are doubling the amount of aid that we are putting in. This is the important thing that the member across the way should understand. The Government of Canada is doubling the amount of foreign aid within the next three to four years. We are even doubling the amount of aid within that envelope for Africa. Within that is something very exciting which is going to meet seven out of eight of the millennium development goals through the Canada Corps.
What is the greatest challenge in developing countries, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa? It is the lack of capacitives, a lack of doctors, nurses, teachers, engineers to build roads, hydrologists, and agricultural experts. There is an absence of that. What is Canada doing? Through the Canada Corps, we are mobilizing a professional core of individuals who want to work overseas to increase these capacitives. That is truly exciting.
That means we will be able to increase the capacitives on the ground. We will teach people in foreign countries how to be doctors, how to be nurses, and how to provide health care. We are going to provide them with the technological capabilities and organizational abilities to have the infrastructures. We are going to give them the basic tax structures, work with them to develop an independent judiciary, develop the map for economic policies that will enable these countries to mobilize the extraordinary resources that they have within their own country's borders.
One of the greatest tragedies of sub-Saharan Africa is that it has 40% of the world's natural resources, but it is the only place in the world where the numbers of the poor are increasing. HIV-AIDS is eviscerating the economies of these countries killing more than two million people a year.
What is the Canada Corps going to do? My colleague from the government has articulated that we are going to put money that the Bloc should understand will go directly into increasing capacitance on the ground in these areas to break the poverty cycle. It will enable these countries, with good governance, to use these resources and pour these resources for the benefit of their people, which is truly exciting.
Canada will be at the forefront of that and at the G-8 summit in Scotland it will be one of the cornerstones of what we are going to be putting forward.
Is it not more important to ensure that taxpayers' money will be spent wisely rather than simply increasing the amount of money we have? Is it not more important that we ensure that taxpayers' money will be spent wisely and effectively first before we increase the amount of money up to the .7 that the member put forward?
We are trying to ensure that our resources are going to be spent wisely first, focused and effective, and that we have a gradual ramp up in increasing the amount of resources we have.