Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the comments made by the member. One would think that with all the glowing accomplishments by the government that it would be supporting a national strategy to fight poverty in our country. The real problem is that she was just speaking about dealing with the symptoms, not with the root causes that we are confronting here in our country every single day.
The parliamentary secretary talked about older worker adjustment. What she failed to address is the policies of her government that have made these kinds of programs more and more necessary.
This country's manufacturing sector is in decline. Where is the auto strategy? Where is the steel sector strategy? What about the softwood sellout that has decimated our forestry sector? That is why we are talking about older worker adjustment. Those policies were put in place by the Conservative government.
The parliamentary secretary also talked about immigrants, the problems they face and the often higher rates of poverty that are confronting immigrants in our country. Of course, she is absolutely right about that, but the reason for that is that the government actually goes abroad advertising decent jobs for newcomers right here in Canada. It makes a comprehensive false advertising campaign luring people over here and when they get here they cannot get accredited. That is why immigrants are facing higher rates of poverty.
The government is not dealing with the root causes of the issues that she speaks about.
There is hypocrisy is terms of what is happening for seniors in the country. I have spoken a number of times on the issue of the consumer price index and the miscalculated rate of inflation. Seniors have been shortchanged by the government for the last five years. Clearly, seniors are not benefiting from the policies of the government.
I wonder if the member could read our motion again, look at the absolute need in the country for a comprehensive anti-poverty strategy and not just recognize that it is not good enough just to deal with the symptoms but rather that we need to get to the root causes of poverty in our country. I would urge her and her caucus to get behind the NDP motion.