Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. friend for the question. We do need to develop a trust when we are embarking on something different. We have dabbled a little bit in the private-public way of doing things, particularly with road construction.
I am pleased, assuming the member speaks for his party, that it will support this private-public membership for highway construction. If I misunderstood that, I apologize.
I have some difficulty with the simplistic way Reform is looking at it. The hon. member is saying that two cents a litre is collected as a tax on gasoline, why not take the two cents and put it back into road construction? However, how far do we want to go?
Where would the money for health care be generated if everything is designated? What is out there in the marketplace that is generating money which could be designated to health or education? That is the difficulty with the argument. I heard it when we travelled with the committee. It sounds like a very simplistic way of doing it but there is nothing wrong with that if it would work.
The difficulty I have is projecting it a bit and asking how far we want to go with it. Do we want every dollar collected by the government to be directed into a specific area? If we do that the government's hands would be tied. It would have no money for the services Canadians demand and want for which there is no money being generated. Would the hon. member propose to use the money generated for highways and for no other purpose? This is the problem I have with the member's position.