Mr. Speaker, the hon. member spoke of a $42 billion deficit in 1993. What he failed to mention was that that deficit, as a percentage of GDP, was actually reduced by half from what the Mulroney government had inherited in 1984 from the previous Liberal government. In fact it was reduced by half as a percentage of GDP.
He also forgot to mention that program spending, which was growing every year by 15% under that previous Liberal government, was reduced to zero under the Mulroney government. He also made some other omissions.
The Economist magazine's 1998 year preview for Canada stated that the credit for the elimination of the deficit in Canada belonged to the structural reforms made by the previous government, that is, the Mulroney government, and it listed specifically free trade and GST as being those policies that were most instrumental in the elimination of the deficit.
I would like to ask him if he is aware of what his party's position was on free trade and the GST in the 1988 and 1993 elections. I am curious as to where his party stood, prior to being elected, on those two fundamental policies which his party and government has embraced and utilized.
I would certainly hope that his party was not, as some people have told me, vociferously opposed to those policies. Surely to goodness his party would not have embraced those policies so warmly in government that it opposed so vociferously in opposition. That would mean that it effectively had to swallow itself whole on this and many other issues. I would really appreciate his feedback on that.