Madam Speaker, in terms of government waste, it is not difficult to identify areas of government spending that can be reduced by the Liberal government.
I am sure the hon. member would agree with me that the $1 billion wasted on the Liberals' failed gun registry would be a good place to start in terms of reducing spending and prioritizing spending to reflect the needs of Canadians.
In terms of economic development strategies, there is a divergence in opinion between the hon. member and me. My party does have a history of supporting regional development strategies. We believe in effective regional development strategies.
Today the government has failed to adapt to the realities of this century some of the economic development strategies introduced 10 to 15 years ago. The government should be taking a leadership role in adapting our economic development strategies to involve more private sector initiatives and the venture capital community in the decision making process. This would ensure that not just government bureaucrats are involved in the decision making, but that there is some level of economic thought and private sector analysis of business opportunities. That is where the government has failed. I am certain the member would agree with me on that.
In terms of the Kyoto agreement and environmental policy, I fear that there is another divergence. The hon. member does not seem to realize that bad environmental policy ultimately is bad economic policy. If we fail to internalize the externalities of bad environmental policy now, ultimately the cost of fixing those issues down the road will be far greater.
I would argue that we cannot extricate economic policies from environmental policies. They have to be integrated. Every policy and every initiative that we put forward as a party and every initiative that the government puts forth should be evaluated both from an economic perspective and in lockstep from an environmental perspective. The hon. member has not thought this through. If we ignore environmental issues and the imperatives of strong environmental policy, ultimately the economic cost of correcting those mistakes will outweigh dramatically the short term cost savings of ignoring them.