Mr. Speaker, people have studied and worked on this challenge for a number of years to figure out how a country so wealthy as ours could all of a sudden have such poverty, with people sleeping on our streets. If we talked to them, they will tell us it started in a very serious way when the previous Liberal government got rid of the Canada assistance plan.
That was the vehicle the federal government used to ensure there was enough money flowing to the provinces and the municipalities to deal with these issues. It was the vehicle that used to ensure there was accountability, that the money being transferred for programs was actually being spent on those programs.
When the Canada assistance plan was dropped, it was the tool box the federal government gave to the provinces—