Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the hon. minister for the depth of his understanding of the problem. The only scary part of it is that I found myself agreeing with almost everything he said.
There is one point I do want to raise. I would like to ask the hon. minister if he would clarify for us whether indeed it is true that perhaps some of the fiscal policy of the government has indeed resulted in a net increase over and above the investment that foreigners direct into Canada. Has foreign direct investment to Canada been exceeded by the direct investment in other countries by Canadian firms? There has been a shift and there is a negative balance there.
It is all very well to speak about how wonderful it is that people have invested in Canada. I think he made the statement that this reflects the maturity of the Canadian economy. I would like to suggest to the minister that he should clarify that, indeed, it is not the maturity of the Canadian economy here that has caused this negative balance. In fact, the reason that people are investing more money outside of Canada than in Canada is due to the fiscal policy of the government.