Madam Speaker, I would gladly let my hon. colleague from Mégantic-Compton-Stanstead speak but, as you so rightly said, I am the member for Québec-Est. My riding of Québec-Est is an urban riding. I am not from a rural but an urban riding. I know of a number of farmers in my riding but they are all retired.
I nonetheless appreciate the importance of agriculture. I know that agriculture is one of the pillars of the economy, particularly in Quebec, which is about to become a country. Agriculture is a basic economic sector. I also learned a thing or two about this sector from working, a few years ago, for Agriculture Canada minister Eugene Whelan, who was considered as one of the greatest ministers of agriculture in Canadian history.
So, I am familiar with this inequity issue that was discussed at length today. It is well known that Quebec farm producers were treated less fairly than those from the rest of Canada, and Western Canada in particular. The latest budget tabled in this House by the Liberals provides a most glaring example of inequity. It is plain obvious.
While Western producers are very generously compensated-we are talking about $2 billion-subsidies paid to milk producers in the East are being cut by 30 per cent. I must say that this is nothing new. There was much talk about this here today. Quebec has not been getting its fair share for ages now.
Had one quarter of federal spending for Canadian agriculture been going to Quebec, since it is normally calculated on a per capita basis, Quebec would have been much better off. Instead, Quebec got 10, 12 and sometimes as much as 15 per cent, but never a full 25 per cent share of federal spending. According to my calculations, on this basis, Quebec's shortfall for the past 15 years, since 1980, is between five and seven billion dollars.