Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his kind remarks.
One of the things that has intrigued me the most about some of the comments members of the third party have made is that they keep saying the government did not cut taxes. Why did it not? They say it would stimulate the economy.
I want to quote a politician that the opposition knows very well, Premier Klein of Alberta. He has given advice to another friend of ours, the premier of Ontario, on the issue of making major tax cuts as part of his overall game plan.
I want to put it on the record because I think this must be the only group in Canada that thinks you can make these tremendous changes and reduce the deficit and get it under control while at the same time cut revenues by 30 per cent, as Mr. Harris has suggested.
Let me read the advice that Mr. Klein gave to Mr. Harris the other day, as quoted in the Toronto Star . ``Harris is wrong to be planning to cut taxes at the same time as he is cutting government spending. I think he is going to have real difficulty doing both. Here in Alberta we never even contemplated a tax cut. Our focus was entirely on eliminating the deficit''.
I concur with that. I believe that anybody who thinks that Mike Harris is going to give Ontarians a 30 per cent deal with his fiscal problems is smoking something that is illegal in Canada.
I cannot believe that the members opposite keep suggesting to us that we have not done a good job with our budget because we did not give a tax cut. I just thought maybe the members would keep in mind that their friend in Alberta disagrees with them.