Madam Speaker, I would like to point out the facts exactly as the member has asked me to do.
The Liberal government has taken $30 billion out of health care since 1994 and this year it is putting $1 billion back in. For every 30 bucks it has cut, it is putting one dollar back. And the Liberals call that reinstating funding for health care. That is appreciated. I guess $1 billion is better than no billions but the government has cut $30 billion in terms of the total losses to health care in the last five years.
Saskatchewan receives a little over $1 billion in all the various transfer payments. The question I would ask the member is how many billions does the government take out in terms of income taxes, licences, GST and other fees for the federal treasury? I can say it is a heck of a lot more than $1 billion. It is billions more than $1 billion. We are sharing that with the rest of the country. We are happy to do that and we are getting some of it back but not all of it, so let us call a spade a spade.
There is a debt in the country. Every single Canadian, whether born this minute or 79 years old, is paying $1,400 a year in interest on the Liberal-Conservative-Reform debt. A family of four is paying $5,600 for the Liberal-Conservative-Reform debt and the Liberals are giving a $250 a year tax cut. Are they crazy? I think they are. It is ridiculous.
We have to look at the budget. I give the Liberals credit. They are masters at doing and saying things to make people feel good. There may not be any kind of substance to their actions but they can do their spinning and promoting. They have 155 MPs and hundreds of millions of dollars as we found out during the last month, to do those sorts of things, to make people feel good about things that they are supposed to be doing, might be doing or may want people to believe they are doing. On every occasion it is a feel good approach. There is never any substance to address the hard core issues facing Canadians.
The final point the member raised was with respect to agriculture. Yes, they have paid $2 billion with provincial shares into agriculture in the last two or three years. Saskatchewan out of $2 billion may have received about $400 million or $500 million. The vast majority went to Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada.
My final response to the member's question is that the government has done a good job for farmers in Ontario. I see my colleagues from the rural Liberal caucus in Ontario. They have done a good job getting money for their farmers but they have failed to address the western agricultural issues and that is where we are falling down in western Canada. They should provide more money to farmers, whether they are in Ontario, Quebec, or western Canada. The government needs to address the huge issue of the restructuring of agriculture in western Canada as soon as possible.