Mr. Speaker, I hope the hon. member was not speaking disparagingly about the NDP, the Bloc or the Conservative Party. That would be a shame.
Having said that, what I said before is that in the Irish situation they did reduce taxes. They did make investments. They did relax labour laws. They did remove the rules and regulations that choked the private sector.
They did not make an investment in handouts to the private sector. The large numbers of international companies that have gone into Ireland, high tech companies such as IBM, Xerox and many others, have gone there to set up shop because the tax structure, the labour laws and the educational standards are excellent.
We have been asking for a long time that we look at those pillars of an economy that make it strong, like the lower taxes, the removal of egregious rules and regulations and the strong educational system, and ensure that the country has them.
Handouts from HRDC that go to friends of the government in power are not what they do in Ireland. That would crush the private sector and prevent people from getting employed. The hon. member just needs to look to the auditor general to know what is really going on at HRDC.