Madam Speaker, I would like to thank our colleague from the Progressive Conservative Party, who forms a committee of the whole with his two colleagues in the House, for asking me this vitally important question.
Our colleague knows that Bernard Landry is a man of substance, a man capable of thinking ahead. The $841 million to which our colleague refers is an amount placed in trust for future needs. Had it been used immediately in the government's accounting, part of it would have had to be allocated to servicing the debt. Like his colleague the Minister of Health, the Minister of Finance wanted a massive allocation of resources for health, rather than paying off the debt now, since we know very well that, with the Canadian dollar as weak as it is, the debt is more or less paying itself off automatically. That is the reasoning behind the handling of that $841 million.
I can assure my colleague, and all members of this House, that the Parti Quebecois government is going to invest all resources available to it into health. As I have stated, health costs rise in the order of 4% annually. We are familiar with how that 4% breaks down. I have the figures here. Out of a total pressure of 4%, population growth accounts for 1.3% of that, technological change, 1% and inflation, 2%. This is why there is a 4% annual increase in the costs of the health system.