Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My interest is in relation to debt. I grew up in Fort McMurray. You may have heard of it. It's a small little town of about 150,000 people in northern Alberta. In 1967 there were about 1,500 people there, and I remember back in the seventies when the economy was extremely hot, interest rates went up to, I think, about 22% to 24%. Then we had what I remember as the national energy program, which closed down pretty much every business in northern Alberta—in fact, all but about two. I remember one was my parents' and the other was a lottery, which means that you either have to be a government-run monopoly or very, very cheap.
That was a joke, by the way.
I'm interested in debt interest charges, as I did see a tremendous number of businesses go broke because they couldn't afford the high interest rates of 22% to 24%. We, of course, are in an interesting area right now. The Government of Canada has very low interest rates, and we have an opportunity to balance our books and actually pay off debt.
My question is, what would happen if interest rates returned to their 1980 levels, relating to public debt? What would happen to public debt interest charges?