Mr. Gary Goodyear, Member of Parliament for Cambridge

On behalf of

The Honourable Diane Finley, Minister of Human Resources and Social Development

Opening Event for Meadows Court Properties

120 – 140 West River Street,
Paris, Ontario
November 24th, 2006
3:00 p.m.

Check against delivery

Good afternoon. Bonjour.

I am pleased to be here today, on behalf of my colleague, the Honourable Diane Finley, Minister of Human Resources and Social Development — and the Minister responsible for Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. Today, we celebrate the opening of Meadows Court.

Here in Paris, and right across the country, Canada's New Government is getting things done for Canadians. Just yesterday, Minister Flaherty announced Advantage Canada which is a new and long overdue economic plan for Canada. We are setting out to pay down the national debt by 2021, and the interest saved will go towards reducing taxes for all Canadians. Earlier this year, we announced a budget plan to lower taxes and help with choice in child care by giving parents $100 a month for each child under six.

We recently proposed a Tax Fairness Plan that includes an increase in the Age Credit Amount, and would permit income splitting for pensioners — delivering over a billion dollars of new tax relief annually for Canadian seniors and pensioners. We've also introduced important new changes to Compassionate Care leave, brought in incentives to help young people get into the trades through apprenticeship grants, provided $1 billion for post-secondary education, and made an additional $1.4 billion commitment to affordable housing in our last budget.

Our ongoing commitment to affordable housing is helping to provide support for projects like the one we're celebrating today. Meadows Court will provide 24 units of housing, serving the needs of single people, families, seniors and persons with disabilities.

Canada's New Government is very proud to be working in close cooperation with the Province of Ontario to fund this project, through federal funding of about $567,000 under the Canada – Ontario Affordable Housing Agreement.

Through CMHC, our national housing agency for more than 60 years, the federal government provides approximately $2 billion a year in housing assistance across the country. This primarily supports some 633,000 lower-income households. For the people of Ontario, this represents a total of about $705.5 million annually — in support of about 237,000 lower-income households.

Today's event marks an important step forward for the people of Paris and demonstrates what we can achieve when we work together. When it comes to building communities, it takes the efforts of many to achieve success. It takes partnerships at all levels of government. And it also takes creative and innovative people with a vision.

Thank you to all those involved in this project, especially everyone at Meadows Court Properties Inc. Your expertise in revitalizing older properties is what has helped this project succeed. What was formerly a commercial property — a Penman's site, to be precise — can now be used to meet the housing needs of the people of this community. Thank you for all you are doing.

Thank you for joining us today. Merci.