Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. Yesterday, according to the daily newspaper La Presse , the Minister of Finance told the Conseil du patronat du Québec about the government's budgetary about-face in favour of a tax increase. This means the minister has given up on the need to reduce government spending.
Are we to understand that, instead of showing it had the guts to reduce government spending and plug tax loopholes for the wealthy, the government has decided to reduce the deficit at the expense of the middle class already infuriated by successive tax increases in recent years?