Mr. Speaker, when the minister talks about building something together, I am with him. When he talks about a consensus, I am also with him. When he talks about building bridges, everyone agrees with this.
But I would remind him that, since Mr. Lesage, we have been trying to build such bridges year after year. One after the other, the Liberal Party in Quebec, the Union Nationale, the Parti Quebecois tried to negotiate in the best of faith, and without bias as even the Liberals then in power met with failure. When Jean Lesage coined the phrase "Masters in our own house", he knew what he was talking about.
The minister referred to Mr. Trudeau earlier. If I understood correctly, he was saying that Mr. Trudeau kind of brought people together at some point. I am sorry, but if there is someone who isolated Quebec, it is Mr. Trudeau himself. So how can you tell me that Mr. Trudeau tried to bring Quebec into the fold.
The minister said earlier that he was insulted by the fact that I was referring to two peoples. I must repay him in kind by saying that he in turn has insulted the people of Matapédia-Matane, 64 per cent of whom voted for an independent Quebec. Sixty-four per cent of the people in my riding said yes so that we can have our
own country. That is a lot of people, and not only the member for Matapédia-Matane.
On another point, as I said earlier, there are many unemployed people in my riding. It is the minister himself who put forward the proposed employment insurance reform. In my riding, they called this poverty insurance. They say, and I think they are right, that the fund comes from employee and employer premiums. How can they take money from people who are hard-pressed to earn $20,000, $22,000 or $23,000 a year?
Our forestry workers work with chain saws in the heat of summer from five in the morning until late in the evening. It is back-breaking work. Those who have never done such work should try it.
I therefore make a suggestion to the minister who, I think, was behind this employment insurance: Since there will be a $5 billion surplus in this fund next year, why not distribute it among the regions to create jobs instead of unemployment?