Thank you to the minister for being here.
You know the program is a good one when the opposition have to go to great lengths to try to manufacture criticisms about it. The biggest whopper is the one perpetrated by the Liberal Party that there are actual cuts in funding for infrastructure. I think they are hoping to count on the complexities of what's in a budget, the timing of spending in an estimate, and the public accounts that verify at the end of it. I think they are hoping Canadians will buy that argument.
The truth is, the money is budgeted, announced in budget 2013. The estimates will track the actual timing of spending as the allocations are made. Gas tax transfers will go out first, because they are a direct transfer to a municipality. Invoices as they come on stream from completed projects will be reflected in estimates, and then ultimately, the public accounts will clean up how much was actually spent in a year.
Is that a fair, accurate representation, that there's actually no cut to the funding? It's the timing of spending they are trying to use as a means of somehow suggesting there's no funding available.