Mr. Speaker, the PQ Minister of Finance has just sent a troubling message to the people of Quebec regarding the debt load an independent Quebec would have to carry.
Instead of coming across as and acting like a serious and responsible administrator, the PQ government's finance minister has decided to add to the uncertainty surrounding statements made by the Bloc leader by asking: "When Mr. Martin says that negotiations will be impossible, does it mean that he will shoulder full responsibility for the debt?"
Are we to understand from what the minister said that a PQ government might decide to stop paying its debts, while at the same time expecting its taxpayers to continue paying all their taxes? Is that the new concept of tax fairness that would be applied in an independent Quebec?