Madam Speaker, again I thank my colleague from Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup—Témiscouata—Les Basques for his excellent question.
I want to stress the words he used in his question. I believe he chose them well. He asked me if I understood government's attitude.
Of course we can see what the attitude of the government is. We can grasp it and have an idea of what it is, but as far as being able to understand the rationale behind the decisions made by the government, it's a totally different ball game.
Indeed, at least during the days and weeks following the murderous attacks of September 11, it seemed that the government was, shall we say, riding on its so-called excellent economic performance of the last few years hoping, I believe, that the impact on the Canadian economy would not be too severe, thus avoiding having to hold a public debate on the use of the surpluses.
For the past few years the government has tried very hard to avoid at all cost any kind of public debate on the use of surpluses, knowingly and willingly underestimating them each and every year. The Liberal government forecasts regarding the surpluses were off by $57.9 billion, whereas the Bloc Quebecois was only off by $2.9 billion.
During all those years the finance minister said that my colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot and my Bloc Quebecois colleagues were completely off the wall with their forecasts. However it would appear that the one who was off the wall in this story was not necessarily the one who was accused of being so.
One wonders what the government was doing or thinking in the wake of the September 11 events when it had become obvious it was going to have to intervene vigorously.
For a number of days now, the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology has been hearing representatives from various industrial sectors in Canada pleading with the government to take action. They offered a whole range of suggestions, going from eliminating or lowering the payroll tax and the capital tax to investing more and more quickly in the infrastructure. A lot of suggestions are being made. For its part, the government seemed to be hiding behind some kind of inertia with regard to the situation.
Is the government's attitude understandable? I would say not. I hope the minister will finally answer our many questions when he presents his budget in December.