Mr. Speaker, I recall the Liberal government in the 1993 election campaign promised to rip up the free trade agreement and to eliminate the GST. Two of those items are probably the fundamental reasons the country is doing so well. Tax revenues increased substantially over the last four years. Most of that is because growth has come from free trade and not from growth within the economy.
Back in the late eighties there was a worldwide recession and high interest rates. It was not just applicable to Canada. It was applicable to a lot of the countries around the world. Many governments, organizations and corporations have now cleaned up their act. They realize they cannot spend more money than they have. That is why we are seeing the growth we are seeing now.
It has nothing to do necessarily with some of the cuts that have been made. I commend the government for being the first government in 27 years to balance the budget. That is a novel idea. Now we must focus our attention on the debt. We must also focus our attention on getting Canadians back to work.
We must recognize that the neighbour to the south of us is a great opportunity for us. We have to get our country more in line with the neighbour to the south of us if we want to create the jobs and be competitive. Some 80 per cent of all our trade is going to the neighbour to the south.