Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Athabasca quoted me out of context. What I said is that farmers are in good shape as we enter this period of depressed income in certain areas. That means we are in better shape than we would be if we had not put the programs in place that we have.
The Canadian farming community is coming off the best five years on average in the history of the country. That is not saying that all this money is in the bank waiting to be spent. But there is $2.5 billion in the NISA accounts which is put there specifically for this purpose, to access in times of a downturn in the economy whether it is a collapse of markets or a collapse of price.
We have these programs like advanced payments for crops in place. The situation would be much more difficult if these programs were not in place and if farmers had not been saving and putting money into the NISA accounts.