Madam Speaker, that is a serious question and it emphasizes the point that we are dealing here with a question of priorities.
I personally would not spend the $500 million, or whatever it is we are spending, on the gun registry. It is a waste of money and a mistake.
I talked about government advertising. The government is spending excessively on advertising; $75 million, that we can trace in one piece of the estimates, for ads that need not run and serve no public purpose.
How much money can we gain here? We can gain millions of dollars here. There is money in the EI account that could be directed toward this.
I take the member's point. This is a difficult question of priorities. We must, when considering it, consider not only the moneys we might need to take from other expenditures or from government services, but we must also consider the cost of doing nothing.
What will be the cost in the future if our farm population continues to age and no young people are prepared to go into the production of secure, high quality food? What will we do in the future if we continue to downgrade the infrastructure that is available in rural communities, communities that contribute significantly to the quality and distinctiveness of Canadian life?
What do we do in the future if Canadian consumers are forced to pay for foreign food because we have made it less and less possible for Canadians to produce high quality, secure food at home?
The questions are serious but when they are considered by the Liberal government agriculture always comes out last. That is not acceptable.