Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank all of my hon. colleagues in the House who have spoken to my motion to eliminate child poverty in Canada.
I also need to thank all of the local agencies and not-for-profit organizations and advocates who are supporting this motion across this country. I thank my constituents of Scarborough—Rouge River, who have spent hours and days and weeks supporting my motion by making sure there were increasing conversations in our community and signing our petitions and spreading the word within our community and neighbourhood.
An umbrella organization called Campaign 2000, through its vibrant network of national, regional, and local partner organizations. has done so much work to get the word out about the motion to end child poverty in Canada. I must also say a very special thanks to the campaign called Keep the Promise, because it is 25 years ago that we in this House, as members of Parliament, made a promise to end child poverty by the year 2000. Now 25 years have come and gone, and we have not kept that promise.
I would like to speak very quickly about a report that has come from the Conference Board of Canada. It says that Canada is 12th out of 17 compared to our peer countries with respect to income inequality. Income inequality in our country has grown over the last 20 years. The gap continues to grow. Since 1990, the richest group of Canadians continues to get richer while the poorest group of Canadians continues to get poorer in our country. That is absolutely abhorrent and unfair, and it is not Canadian values.