Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge the beginning of Mental Illness Awareness Week, a national campaign coordinated by the Canadian Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health.
Mental Illness Awareness Week encourages us all to learn more about the realities of the one in five Canadians who will experience a mental illness this year. Everyone is affected by this. Today, as the alliance hosts Mental Health on the Hill and meets with parliamentarians to discuss the barriers to access and affordability of mental health care, I call on the Minister of Health to take urgent action to address the suicide crisis and the lack of services to support those living with mental illness in Canada.
I invite my colleagues to attend the function this evening, speak with some of the alliance members, and meet the 2017 faces of mental illness who are bravely sharing their journeys of recovery.