Mr. Speaker, I would not characterize it as a lobby group. The reality is that it is doing incredibly important work.
Child care is an extremely important issue. When Mr. Chrétien was the prime minister and the member for LaSalle—Émard was the minister of finance, we invested incredible amounts of money into the provinces for child care spaces. The provincial government at that time, Mike Harris' Progressive Conservative government, tried to block that money from flowing to the cities. Therefore, we could not create those child spaces in cities like Toronto. About $180 million were given directly to the City of Toronto through the transfers from the federal coffers to the provinces. We could not access that money when I was in city council because the government at that time, the Progressive Conservative government of Mike Harris, refused to transfer that money.
Maybe that is the Conservatives' hidden agenda. If they do not believe in the child care program they should be honest and say that they do not believe in child care spaces, that they do not believe in investing in early learning and child care spaces, that they do not believe in investing in our cities and that they do not believe in investing in housing, in communities and in helping the homeless and the poor in our country. What they are not able to say directly, their programs and their actions clearly indicate exactly where they stand on these issues. They should be honest with their constituents and our people and say quite clearly that they do believe in these programs.