Help A Village Effort

Help A Village Effort

Extract from the 39th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION
EDITED HANSARD • NUMBER 112

Mr. Scott Simms (Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, Lib.):

Mr. Speaker, since 1999 the community of Glovertown in my riding, with matching funds from CIDA, has managed to raise enough money from its annual Walk for Water to provide 85 artesian wells for needy villages in India. As their member of Parliament, I am extremely proud of this remarkable achievement, a feat that is unlikely to be matched by any other community of its size.

As members may know, Help A Village Effort, or HAVE is a voluntary non-governmental organization which a constituent of mine, Mr. Gerard Feltham, and his friends started in 1982 when he was living in Haliburton-Minden, Ontario.

Since 1982 nearly 700 safe drinking water systems and many essential education and health services have been provided to thousands of needy families in hundreds of villages, particularly in India. The bulk of its support comes through the efforts and donations of friends and relatives.

Walk for Water events are now taking place in communities in British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Ontario.

This small group of people are to be commended for their outstanding efforts to improve the lives of those less fortunate and for making this world a better place.