Madam Speaker, there is a very important role for the federal government to play in housing. I want to talk specifically about affordable housing. The reality is that, yes, the federal government was involved in building affordable housing back in the 1960s and 1970s. The federal government did that. I think, personally, of all the experience I have had in affordable housing in Kingston. I sat on the affordable housing development committee before I was a city councillor. As a city councillor, I continued to sit on that committee. As mayor, I saw a lot of legacy projects.
The reality is that the affordable housing that the federal government was involved in building in the 1960s and 1970s, unfortunately, led to stigmatization and the ghettoization of housing. If he wants me to dream bigger, and I will do that with him right now, the proper way to build affordable housing is to build it in a way that integrates it into a community. We should not have 100 affordable units all together. We should have 10 affordable units in 10 different areas of the city, of the community, because that actually allows the affordable units to be integrated throughout the community.
We decrease the stigmatization, not only of the affordable housing that is being offered but also of those who live in the housing and the way they interact with folks who are not living in affordable housing. In particular, the style of affordable housing that was being offered back in the 1960s and 1970s was stigmatized. There is an incredible amount of work that can be done here, and there is a role for the government to play in this.
I have always supported what I have said in terms of what that role is.