Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to be back in the House. I missed all my colleagues. I trust that feeling is mutual. It is good to be back here to address the business of the nation.
I want to offer my condolences to the family of Kirsty Duncan, with whom many of us served.
I also want to take this opportunity to express my solidarity with the brave people of Iran, who have endured unspeakable violence and are struggling for their freedom and for respect for their fundamental human rights. As others have said, I believe the lion and the sun will rise again, and we must do all we can to support the brave people of Iran.
Tonight I am following up on a question that I asked previously about youth unemployment. Meanwhile there are new figures out on unemployment in this country, and we see the continuance of the youth unemployment crisis. The latest numbers show a 0.3% increase in the unemployment rate and a 0.5% increase in youth unemployment, from 12.8 % to 13.3%. Those are very high recession levels of youth unemployment, with 73,000 more unemployed, an increase in the number of unemployment of 73,000 people in that month. Meanwhile, while there are employment struggles in the private sector, we have the biggest public sector ever.
Those numbers were reflected in the conversations I have been having with young people and people of all ages across the country. In January I visited five different university campuses; I was at U of A, two universities in the Toronto area and two in Nova Scotia. The question I have been asking students is whether they are better off or worse off than their parents' generation. I will report back to members of the House, and I think it is important to recognize this, that young people overwhelmingly say they are worse off than their parents' generation.
Key reasons for that are the employment situation and the housing crisis. The struggle for homes and for jobs is top of mind for today's young people, who are concerned that they do not and will not have the same standard of living as their parents, in particular because of the struggle to afford a home and find a job. Compounding that are general affordability concerns, especially the high cost of food. That is what young people are dealing with in this country.
I think that to solve this problem we have to look squarely on the reality that the problem exists, to magnify the voices of young people who are concerned, and to talk about concrete solutions. That is why, in the fall, the Conservatives announced the Conservative youth jobs plan. We took a very constructive approach.
Sadly, the Liberals have moved in the opposite direction in many respects. For instance, we have proposed fixes to training that would support and recognize instances where young people are seeking skills that would make them job-ready. In fact the government is going in the opposite direction by its proposal to pull grant funding from students who are studying at career colleges. We are concerned about the present situation and about the direction of the government that is actually making things worse for young people looking for jobs, homes and hope.
In this new year, is the government prepared to change direction and take seriously the constructive proposals the Conservatives have put forward?