Mr. Speaker, I have a great deal of respect for the Minister of National Revenue and I will ask her a question based on the premise of certain situations for certain budget lines that I have talked about in the aboriginal community.
The Minister of Finance and the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development have thrown numbers around out of context, which is very dangerous, such as $10 billion or $16,000 per first nations person, which really drives a politics of resentment between people. These numbers are very dangerous out of context. Unfortunately, the budget has shown a degree of indifference toward the problems that poverty presents.
As a member of Parliament, I also have the responsibility to see through the eyes of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development with respect to some of the initiatives.
I myself support market based housing and the $300 million that has been talked about, but at the same time when I look at my home community, for example, of 3,000 people in Pelican Narrows, there are a few hundred people employed, maybe 400 people with the ability and 80% or so who are in social housing. They want to break out of that. They would like to have social programs and supports, and so on and so forth.
I am a little concerned that those people are being shut out of opportunities to break out of living conditions of 10 to 12 people per house. There is no way out for them under the current process with any initiative in place. I would like to hear how we could address that. Maybe the minister could provide her opinion on that matter.