Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his questions. I am glad he asked them.
First, I never brought up a New Jersey model in my speech. To answer his question on tax cuts like there were in New Zealand, the plan we gave the government, the zero in three plan, did not involve an across the board tax cut for anybody.
Reformers maintain that government spending has to be controlled, the deficit has to be brought down to zero and then the debt, the real ogre, must be attacked. That is the plan we gave to the government. That is the plan it ignored.
Second, I did bring up the New Zealand model. It does take time for a country to get back on its feet after decades of overspending. The reality for New Zealand is it took 10 years. For Canada it is probably going to take a similar amount of time. If the changes are made today, we cannot expect to have the results for some years.
The converse of that argument is if the changes are not made things will be a lot worse for a lot longer. That is why we demand that the issues be addressed now, and if the government fails to do that it will imperil the Canadian public.
The hon. member did make a number of erroneous statements. New Zealand is doing better than it has ever done. It is one of the lions in terms of economic growth of countries in the world. Over the last couple of years its economic growth rate has increased dramatically from 5 per cent to 10 per cent.
The hon. member said that kudos have been given to Canada. I suggest the hon. member look at what the International Monetary Fund said. The IMF gave our Minister of Finance a very stern warning, making it very clear that his targets are totally unaccept-
able. That is not the first time. It has been repeated time and time again. The primary international financial agency in the world has told Canada to buck up or it will be in trouble.
The hon. member brought up the issue of free speech. We do not have a bunch of cowardly individuals, such as those who are in government. Many of them say they would like to make changes in the government but are afraid to do so because of the whip structure. At least in our party we can speak our mind, and we do.