Mr. Chair, the Jewish Film Festival is starting soon, and so is the Hot Docs, Reel Films, Planet in Focus, the Inside Out Film Festival. And then the International Film Festival is starting in the fall. It creates thousands and thousands of jobs, it creates GST, it contributes to the economy, it's good for our identity, it talks about who we are as Canadians. These cuts are completely contrary to everything that we, as a country, should stand for.
I look at the bigger picture. The entire heritage department has been cut by 12% year over year in terms of transfer of payment, from $1.1 billion to $960 million. And the stabilization projects, support for endangered arts organizations, those funds, as we need them most because of the economic downturn, seem to have been eliminated. And with Telefilm, there was the cut of $2.5 million. It went from $107 million to $104.6 million, which is probably one of the reasons the training program got hit, because Telefilm also got cut. The Canadian Television Fund, according to the estimates that came out on Thursday, went from--and this is dramatic--$119 million to $20.4 million. So you're looking at a $99.5 million cut--that's a huge cut--in the program book that I have in front of me.
Yes, Richard Florida talked about the creative class. I guess the Conservatives are not seen as the creative class. I don't know what class they're really representing--certainly not the middle class, because a lot of them go to see films and help train a lot of filmmakers and want to support that.
What do you think is the real reason behind these cuts? I don't quite understand the 12% cut in culture all across the board. I can list all the organizations, but you don't want me to go on for five minutes.