Mr. Speaker, the member from the Bloc is right. He and his colleagues in the finance committee do talk endlessly about tax loopholes. In spite of having been given the opportunity on repeated occasions to be able to point out to the finance committee what these tax loopholes are and quantifying them, they have been unable to do that to this point.
However, so that he can come up to speed on the whole concept of tax points and how they affect things, the hon. member should look at our document, if he has a copy of it before him.
On page 57 he will see the impact on post-secondary education of decreasing the cash transfers from the federal government which we have proposed of $200 million. If we transfer the tax points and give the provinces of Quebec, British Columbia and Prince Edward Island the ability to tax in place of the federal government taxing, he will see from the graph that by the year 2014 there is a very substantial net increase in funding for post-secondary education.
I recognize that we released this document just this morning. Perhaps he and some of the Liberal members have not had time to come up to speed.
As another example, if the hon. member would look at page 52 where we are talking about a 15 per cent cut in the entitlement going to seniors, he would see it. The very first line says: "Focus OAS and GIS on those most in need".
In answer to the question in his speech about whether this means everybody will be cut, no, it does not. However, I am really interested in the concept that we are proposing to transfer the ability of the respective jurisdictions, be they provincial or municipal, to deliver the services at the point of need and also to have the tax room for funding.
Apart from the "vive le Québec libre" kind of thing they are getting into, is that not exactly what they are after? I do not understand why there is a conflict between his and our own point of view on this issue.