Mr. Speaker, it was quite a sight yesterday to see the Liberal cheerleaders celebrating the Prime Minister's 32nd anniversary as a member of Parliament. Imagine our surprise when we learned that the Prime Minister was elected on April 8, 1963, not April 4, and that he has been an MP for 28 years, not 32.
I guess the health minister was too busy trying to protect her own job to check the facts. Actually, it comes as no shock to Reformers that the Liberals have such trouble with numbers. After all, this is the same party that gave us a massive deficit, a huge public debt and out of control government spending.
The Prime Minister shrugged off the mistake, saying what is four days among friends and that there is not much difference between 28 and 32 years. Numbers are important and I have a few that this government should take note of.
The national debt is $548 billion. The federal government spends nine times as much on debt payments as it does on education and five times as much as on health. The national unemployment rate is 9.6 per cent and 1.5 million people in this country are unemployed.