It's funny you should say that, because I did exactly that when the Minister of Finance was here back in November. I asked her if she would table the details of all the non-announced spending with the committee, and she refused to do that. It seems like we've hit a bit of a wall on finding out what all this non-announced spending is for. It makes it very difficult for us as parliamentarians to vote on something when we don't know what the money is for.
I know part of your mandate is also economic analysis. I'm wondering what you think of the budget generally speaking. It has $69.7 billion in new growth spending measures. I saw Derek Holt being interviewed on the weekend by Scotiabank, and he thinks that all of this profligate government spending has resulted in at least a 1% increase in the bank rate, which I'd never heard an economist say before.
I'm wondering if you agree that government deficit spending is stimulatory in nature, is inflationary in nature and has resulted in an increase in the bank rate that's above what it would have been had the government not embarked on such a massive spending spree.