Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House today to share the concerns of my constituent, Betty Maxwell, of Neepawa, Manitoba, who comments: "The government has given us a middle of the road budget and with the economic traffic we have that is a very dangerous place to be. We have a budget that is long on rhetoric and short on substance".
Instead of attacking government spending with serious cuts it is actually increasing spending. If this increased spending only brings unemployment down one-tenth of 1 per cent in the first year, it confirms that previous governments by overspending $500 billion have put us at this rate of unemployment.
This budget is very reminiscent of those of previous governments with rosy predictions and miscalculations that Canadians have never been able to rely on. With optimistic forecasts for growth and lack of deficit reduction, it is back to the old philosophy of counting the chicks before they are hatched.