Mr. Speaker, I appreciate having the opportunity, thanks to the brevity of the previous question and answer, to make a quick thank you. I want to thank the member for St. John's West for his comments, not just the manner in which he presented them, but the comments themselves, and the way in which he conducts himself in this chamber is a tribute to all of us.
I really appreciated his comments in this respect. We know the old saying about not seeing the forest for the trees, sometimes the reverse is true, sometimes we cannot see the trees for the forest.
Government members who are on the front bench, having responsibility as cabinet ministers, deal with billion dollar items, and make large massive budgetary decisions. Sometimes they lose an understanding of the impact their decisions have on individual people. The member today reminded us with his comments of the impact that decisions on a multi-billion dollar EI fund have on individual people.
Family members must provide for other family members. There are also people who are burdened with the responsibility of protecting other people with their financial reserves.
In this country, people work in most provinces half the year to pay taxes to a government that manages them or mismanages them. The consequences of mismanagement, in a billion dollar gun registry for example, are real on the impact they have on individual Canadians.
I would like to ask the member, because I understand the difference between the government--