Good morning. I am pleased to rise in the House today to recognize and celebrate Logan Staats, an outstanding singer-songwriter and musician. Born in Ohsweken, on the territory of the Six Nations of the Grand River, Logan started to write songs and perform music in his teens in and around the Brantford–Brant community.

In 2018, the Mohawk Nation artist was chosen from 10,000 hopeful contestants vying for a spot on the musical competition show The Launch. Before 1.4 million viewers, Staats won, and that ushered the breakthrough that would lead him to Nashville and Los Angeles with his single—and it’s amazing, Speaker—“The Lucky Ones.” His song would hit number one in Canada on iTunes.

Staats was also part of a documentary series and uses his talent to bring awareness on Indigenous issues across Canada. In the years from 2018 to today, Staats has come home, making the intentional decision to re-root at Six Nations of the Grand River.

Last month, Speaker, Logan Staats won the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada’s prestigious TD Indigenous Songwriter Award, all this using borrowed equipment at Staats’s apartment and a recording studio on the Six Nations territory.

I quote: “My nation and my community are in every chord I play, and every note I sing. They’ve saved me.” With those words, Logan, we celebrate your accomplishments, and we thank you. Congratulations.

Interruption.

I want to thank the honourable member for his question. In fact, in this last budget, under the leadership of our Premier, we recognized the urgent need for adequate housing to meet the basic needs of many First Nations who are moving from their communities into towns and cities like Kenora, Dryden and Sioux Lookout.

That’s why we invested significant resources to ensure that the Homelessness Prevention Program, moving forward, provides those additional houses. It’s sensitive to the nuances of housing requirements for Indigenous peoples displaced from their home communities and are at risk of homelessness, and require wraparound services from community support organizations. It’s a fully integrated model, Mr. Speaker, and we’re endeavouring to address those matters—

Thank you to the member opposite for that question. It’s a very important question, and our government is taking the issue very, very seriously in terms of the investments that are being made in northern communities, remote communities and, of course, Indigenous communities. There is no exception. We are following through and making investments.

In October 2021, we announced $36 million for community-led Indigenous mental health and addictions service organizations, including supports for students, victim services and an Indigenous-driven anti-opioid strategy.

Our Addictions Recovery Fund was designed to boost capacity in communities of the greatest need: 400 beds, 7,000 spaces, 56% of them in northern and Indigenous communities, in addition to $7 million for land-based care—because we know that culturally safe services need to be delivered to the people where they are.