Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister repeats the numbers that his spin doctors give to him and he conveniently ignores the other statistics.
He ignores the fact that our unemployment rate is higher than the average of the G-7 countries; it is higher than all three of our major trading partners: Japan, Great Britain and the United States. Our unemployment rate is higher than that of New Zealand, higher than that of Switzerland, higher than Sweden's, higher than Australia's, higher than Austria's; it is even higher than the unemployment rate in Mongolia.
Instead of trying to make an atrocious 9.7 per cent unemployment rate sound good, why does the Prime Minister not do something different? Why does he not unleash the job creating power of consumers and businesses by balancing the federal budget, making the government smaller and giving Canadians much needed tax relief?