Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to the motion and to commend my colleague from Fundy--Royal for having the courage to bring forth this kind of motion. It is not something that we would normally expect at this point.
The motion recognizes there is a grave imbalance within Canada with students attending post-secondary education and how they afford to take their education. That imbalance has happened over a number of years, specifically taking a real downturn around 1993, the year the Liberal government came into being as the governing party. It consistently attacked funding and transfer dollars that were going to the provinces to the point that they went from $7 billion to 17% lower than they were. As a result we have seen a situation where provinces become cash-strapped.
Hefty tax dollars come into the federal government via gas taxes, income taxes, GST--