Thank you very much.
Mr. Cross, I'd like to go back to a second point.
You talked about the difference between the financial soundness of the federal government and of the provinces. In fact we expect that the federal government is going to announce a budget surplus. The Conference Board of Canada recently did a study on the discrepancy between the financial and budgetary situations of the two orders of government.
However, one important element seems to go by the wayside, and that is the impact of the federal government's decisions on the provinces. During the 1990s, when the Liberal government cut transfers massively, this placed considerable pressure on the provinces and their capacity to fund programs was affected. I'm referring to programs involving post-secondary education, social assistance, and health. Other more recent decisions on the part of the federal government also had an impact on these matters, among others the reform of employment insurance, which has meant that people are no longer eligible for employment insurance, or no longer have access to it. Because of that fact they wind up on social assistance, which is a provincial program.
The cuts to health transfer increases, that went from 6% to 3%, will have a considerable impact on provincial finances; the Conference Board of Canada estimates that expenditure growth will be 5.2%. Currently, we hear that if the government goes ahead with the pension income splitting measure, this will mean cuts of $1.7 billion to $2 billion in provincial finances.
Consequently, could we also discuss the issue of the role the federal government has in this budgetary pressure that is being placed on the provinces?