Madam Speaker, the member who just spoke invoked my name on a couple of occasions. He took some exception to the fact that I proposed that businesses, industry, entrepreneurs, investors and private individuals should be able to keep more of their money in their pockets and that the government should take less.
I would like to correct the misconception that he may have about that. I believe there is a proper role for the federal government, as there is for provincial and municipal governments. The fact is governments at all levels, but particular evident at the federal level, tax us to death and then seem to have no regard for the money that they have taken out of our pockets in the way they spend it.
The most recent example was on the last day of the fiscal year the Liberals bought a couple of new jets. They were not in the estimates. The Department of National Defence did not indicate that they were required. There was no justification for it as far as we knew. It just came out of the blue that the Liberals had a hundred million dollars to spend.
A hundred million dollars is an awful lot of money extracted from poor working Canadians who on every paycheque are required to forgo in some instances up to half their income in provincial and federal taxes. That is precisely what I am talking about. Instead of increasing the number of people who are totally dependent upon the government for their livelihood, if we left that money in the hands of businesses, entrepreneurs and individuals, our economy would be much better and everyone would be much better off than they are now.
That is my thesis and I stand by it.