Mr. Speaker, I first want to thank my hon. colleague who spent a great deal of time in the finance committee when I chaired it. I am glad to see that he is very consistent in his opposition. I do not want the House to think that somehow we do not have an issue here. Of course we have an issue and the government has said that it would fix the issue in a fair manner.
The hon. member referred to some of the decisions we had to make back in the year 1993 through program review. The hon. member has to understand that in that era Canada was faced with a difficult situation, one that required discipline and one that required us to make some very tough choices.
It is interesting to note that most of the investments we made, after we left the dark age of deficit, brought about a surplus for a number of years and paid down our debt. We also have an excellent macroeconomic environment now where prosperity has taken place.
We also invested in those key areas that I know the hon. member from the Bloc cares about. I spent a great deal of time with him and I know he understands. I remember clearly saying to him that we need to invest in the key social and economic areas.
As the chair of the finance committee back then in my previous role, I listened very attentively. That is the reason we were able to present the package to the Canadian people that included great investments in key areas, such as health, education and research and development, which spur on economic growth.
In fairness, those were not just my ideas. I travelled the country extensively. I listened to people from coast to coast to coast and they told me that if we were able to implement the plan that we in fact implemented that they could rally behind it. There is no question in my mind that Canadians have rallied behind our plan because the economic success of this country is self-evident.