Mr. Speaker, first of all, I will try to comment and ask a few questions, but perhaps not with the same enthusiasm as the hon. member who just spoke.
This reminds me that the same member was just as eager when the Conservatives adopted the GST here in the House of Commons, but he was eager to vote against the GST. He devoted the same energy to preparing the Liberal government's red book which was supposed to abolish the GST.
The hon. member accuses the Bloc Quebecois of being less than honest. On the contrary, we only want to ask the Liberal Party to abide by its promises, to be transparent about what was said in the red book. You know as well as I do that the Liberals did a lot of wailing and hand wringing here in this House. They voted against the GST, which was proposed by the Conservatives and passed by the House under the Conservative government.
Those same Liberals formed a committee, the finance committee, on which I sat for one year. The finance committee is chaired by a Liberal member, the hon. member for Willowdale. For a number of months, I would say for almost a year, the Liberal government led Canadian citizens from Quebec to Vancouver to believe that there was a possibility the government would abolish the GST.
Of course the government wanted to abolish the GST to bring back the old tax, the hidden tax on goods and services. Today's notion of putting a tax on drugs, health care, food and books-the Minister of Finance will legislate a tax on books-did not come from the Reform Party. It came directly from the Liberal Party.
I sat on the finance committee for one year, and the chairman asked witnesses whether they would accept a tax that was hidden in the price of a product. It is a vicious circle. It is not very honest to give witnesses the impression it would cost less. The aim was to
hide the tax in the price of food, medicine and books for educational purposes.
Naturally, the idea does not originate with the Reform Party or the Bloc Quebecois. I have to say before this House that the idea comes from the Liberal Party. Of course, in view of its unpopularity, the Liberal Party backed off. The proof that the Liberal Party failed to meet its obligations, that it was not transparent in what it said in the red book is that the Deputy Prime Minister was forced to resign, because she had made a commitment to abolish the GST within the first year of her mandate. She then spent government money getting re-elected.
Today, the member's knickers are in a twist and he wants us to believe that the Liberal Party is the great defender of the GST, when it never had the option of withdrawing.