Mr. Speaker, in response to the member's question, of course the federal government can spend money as it sees fit.
As a member of the opposition side, when I look at my colleagues from the Bloc Quebecois on my right, yes they are separatists. As far as I am aware, they always will be as long as they call themselves the Bloc Quebecois and are committed to the breakup of the country.
The point Bloc members have been trying to make is that they want control over the money. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever for anybody to think that the panacea of the breakup of the country is going to create jobs. It will do the exact opposite.
Separation of the country will cause unemployment to rise. If Bloc members were interested in helping the people who elected them to this place, they would be working to create employment, to reduce uncertainty, to create an economic climate where people could get work.
When I talk to people in the province of Quebec they seem to be the same as the people I talk to in the province of Alberta. They are concerned about mortgages, houses, careers, their kids and their future. Nobody I talked to was concerned about separation, other than the detrimental effects it will have on their futures. There may be a future of high taxation and low opportunity created through the concept the Bloc is trying to achieve.
Now we see that Bloc members have become totally unprincipled in the fact that they have watered down their separation message by saying: "Please vote for us. We want to separate if we can get some kind of economic association with Canada". I suggest that they put their shoulders to the wheel and join with all Canadians in recognizing that we have a responsibility to all Canadians from coast to coast to provide them with a future, secure housing, education and to provide them with the things they want. I can assure the member, separation is not one of them.