Madam Speaker, I too, would like to thank House staff for staying late and supporting us, not just through the evening tonight, but also in the difficult period of COVID. I hope all are safe.
The member opposite lists a number of initiatives we have committed to that I think are incredibly important as we move to address and end chronic homelessness in this country, and it cannot happen without an indigenous-led urban, rural and northern housing strategy. Leaving it to the three NIOs and investing into the existing streams of housing has not done the job. We need to make sure that communities right across the country, whether in large cities, in the western or eastern part of the country or in the northern territories, require us to respond in different ways.
I want to assure the member opposite that the rapid housing initiative is a billion dollar program that was rolled out on very short notice to deal with the chronic and very dangerous situation facing people without shelter. It is the first instalment of the campaign to end chronic homelessness in this country and is certainly not the last investment. I want to thank him for forwarding and bringing to our attention the project in his riding. It is a good project. I will bring it to the minister's and CMHC's attention on the member's behalf to make sure that he gets a quick response, because his community needs help.
To further talk about the situation facing us as a country, as we take a look at some of the deep cracks or gaps in our social safety net, COVID has shown us why it is essential to address these with urgency and with large investments, and also to make sure those investments land on the ground and are directly invested into communities that are leading the campaign to end chronic homelessness. Cities, towns and communities know best how to spend those dollars. That is why we are very proud to work with the Canadian Federation of Municipalities to deliver these dollars.
I agree that 3,000 units of housing will not solve the problem. That is why we have also committed to the indigenous-led urban, rural and northern housing program. It is why we have also committed to reinvesting dollars into the co-investment fund. It is also why, in the recent fall statement, we put additional dollars into the rental housing fund to build more purpose-built housing. It is also why, in the same fall economic statement, a commitment was made by this government to build 38 shelters for indigenous women on and off reserves, as well as 50 supportive housing units in the coming year as part of the buildup to the response to the missing and murdered indigenous women.
At the end of the day, it is going to take all orders of government working together: indigenous governments, municipal governments, provincial governments and federal governments. There is obviously a housing component to it. There are also mental health and addiction issues that have to be addressed through supportive housing. We need provincial health authorities to make sure the federal funds that flow to the health authorities are spent in these residential settings.
We have a plan. We have a good strong plan. We have a good study coming out of the human resources committee in Parliament right now. We have ministers who are committed. We have a government that is committed and, for the first time in perhaps 30 years, we have all governments pointed in the same direction to achieve the same good things for people right across the country.
I will agree with the member opposite on one final point. If we do not create the indigenous-led urban, rural and northern housing strategy, we will never end chronic homelessness. On the west coast in particular, in B.C. where the homeless counts and point-in-time counts show the massive overrepresentation of indigenous people, this program is so critically needed. It was needed years ago. The good news is that it is on the way, and that we have parties on the other side of House that are willing to support it in a minority Parliament because together we can get this done.
I will say one last thing to my colleagues from British Columbia. This was a very tough weekend in British Columbia for a whole lot of reasons, but we also lost Katherine McParland from Kamloops. She was on our advisory committee as we reprofiled homelessness programs with Reaching Home. She also co-chaired the B.C. government's panel on ending chronic homelessness in B.C. She died very tragically this weekend. We have lost a strong voice of lived experience. She is a young woman who came out of the foster care system, a young woman who struggled and unfortunately is not going to be around to see the fruits of her labour pay off for thousands of other kids. My thoughts are with her family and friends today.
