Mr. Speaker, I am afraid the member is completely wrong in that assessment.
I believe that our big Canadian banks are among the finest bankers in the entire world. They are leaders in the way they run their operations. They are leaders in making prudent business decisions that will benefit not only their companies but also the Canadian economy.
I think it is irresponsible to compare our Canadian bank structure and our Canadian bank expertise with those of the banks that ran into trouble in Asia and in some third world countries.
We can compete and we can lead in the industry with any bank in the world. I do not believe for a moment that our Canadian banks are in any danger of making decisions that would lead to anything like what happened during the Asian flu.
The fact is that the finance minister and this government since 1993 have been dragging their feet on making changes to the financial industry that would allow Canadian banks to get even stronger and have more opportunity to be leaders in the global economy. That is what they have to do. They know it, and this is just one small step.