Mr. Chair, it is great to be participating in this debate tonight. We learned so much about the important issues that first nations and indigenous people are bringing forward, so I would like to thank everybody who has participated. I think we need a lot more of that when it comes to working toward reconciliation.
Specifically looking at Indigenous Services and looking at the PBO report and the executive summary, it clearly indicated that the financial resources allocated to providing indigenous services had increased significantly. Look at the money that is being spent. The department had increased its plan of spending from $9.3 billion in 2018-19 to $39.6 billion in 2022-23 and 2023-24. Authorities for 2022-23 were $44.8 billion. I think this is really important because investing money is important. What we also saw was an increase in the number of full-time employees. It went from 4,200 to 7,200.
When we talk about indigenous services, I want to ensure that we are actually not talking about administration but about water, that we are actually talking about the things that are needed for reserves and those people off reserves.
I am taking this opportunity to speak about things that really matter to me as well, not just the boil water advisories. People who have been in this place have shared a lot with me. I would be remiss if I did not talk about missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, what I have learned and the importance of the red dress alert; the importance of making sure that, if a young indigenous woman or girl goes missing, we know. We must work together to ensure that this gets done. It is going to take all members but we need to get on board to ensure this amber-like alert is there for murdered and missing indigenous women and girls. That is something we must continue to advocate for and continue to work for.
Just moments ago, I was asking about this. If we want to know about indigenous issues or want to talk about indigenous issues, we need to talk to people who know the facts, the people who are on the ground. People provide me with information when I want to talk about Nunavut. I just learned the most heartbreaking information about the increased rate of suicides. If anyone wants to throw a number out there, they would be disgusted because it would be so low. The rate of suicide for those people who are indigenous or Inuit is 25 times that of Canadians. Come on, everyone, what is so wrong with that? When we look at other issues we know that there has been an increase here or there, but 25 times that of Canadians is just appalling.
To those people in Nunavut, we must do all that we can to ensure that services are there for them. We know that it is not just about the services, but it is years and years of history, of perhaps not having the infrastructure. I know that they have been all named in this place. I do not want to miss anything, so I do not want to list them all off tonight because it is very important. If we are working toward reconciliation, we need to do more about this. We cannot let people die. That is exactly what we are doing on our watch. That is not good enough.
We talk a lot at the status of women committee about mental health. One of the greatest challenges is getting mental health services. Imagine if there were no hospital 20 minutes up the road, but instead people had to jump on maybe a propellor, maybe a boat or something like that. Where do people get their mental health services? Those are the questions being asked by so many of the people living in indigenous areas, who are living in those rural and remote areas. We could do better and we should be doing better.
The government has spent so much money and we have seen no results. It has hired so many people with, once again, fewer results. It has increased bonuses with even fewer results. It shuffles money from one place to another. Please, start getting it right. Indigenous people deserve it.
