Mr. Speaker, to say that Montreal is not in such bad shape, I agree. It has its problems, but it is not in such bad shape. But to say that Montreal is in a good shape, referring to the action of the federal government these last twenty years, I think that the speech the Prime Minister made in Montreal this week does not reflect the reality. I will not go so far to say that such a speech is pure hypocrisy.
If Montreal is in a somewhat better shape now, it is certainly not thanks to the federal government. Let us look, for instance, at what the present Prime Minister did when he was Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. He cut part of Montreal's oil supplies. What did the Prime Minister do? What did the federal government do in respect to inflation and the extraordinary interest rates of 20 per cent in 1981-1982 for example? I think such a situation rapidly ruins a city.
What did the federal government do recently when it shut down the Atomic Energy Commission of Canada in Montreal? What did the federal government do when it shut down the Tokamak research centre in Varennes? What is the government doing? The federal
government is doing everything possible to harm the economic development of Montreal, and we have lots of evidence.
Therefore, when the Minister comes and tells us that the Prime Minister made an extraordinary speech-yes, the Prime Minister said extraordinary things such as "We are targeting our investments so that we can help Montreal become a leader in the emerging technologies of tomorrow", I say: What hypocrisy! What a hypocritical speech!