Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague on what I consider one of his best interventions. It was a very eloquent exposé, and I judge interventions in the House by whether I come away from them more knowledgeable than when I stepped into the House to listen to them. I learned a lot from the hon. member's line of argument and his quotes from different experts on this issue.
I would like to come back to the question of small business. The government makes a lot of its so-called support for small business, but I have small business owners coming to see me in my riding office quite frequently. There are two in particular who came to see me who were not very happy with the scientific research and development tax credit, which the government has amended, to the detriment of small business.
In one case, it was a low-tech company that is suffering from a lowering of tariffs in the last budget. It was doing some innovative work to survive and compete. It did not qualify for SR and ED.
Another company was an extremely high-tech company. It was lucky. It got in just under the line, right before the government decided that businesses could not use SR and ED to buy capital equipment. If that had been the case, the company would not have seen the light of day. It would not be what it is today. The equipment it purchases is so specialized that the company cannot get a loan from the bank for that equipment. That equipment does not serve as collateral, because there is no market for it. It is so specialized that a company cannot sell it if the company goes bankrupt, and the bank therefore cannot get its money back.
That change to SR and ED has not been very good for high-tech small business, and low-tech small business does not seem to be benefiting either. I would like my hon. colleague's comments on that.