Mr. Speaker, I listened to the Liberal member's speech. He should know that his party got elected by being very opportunistic. Since he was talking about taxes, I would remind him that the GST is still here.
In fact, the member for LaSalle—Émard, who was a co-author of the red book 10 years ago, said at one time that this stupid tax must go. Yet he raised $190 billion from Canadians during his tenure as the finance minister.
Gasoline taxes in British Columbia raise about $750 million. On top of that, the GST is about $378 million. In total, taxes on gasoline raise about $1.1 billion. Of that amount, the federal government spends only 2.5% on road and infrastructure development; whereas the provinces, which share 50% of the taxes, spend about 91%. In the United States, the government spends or invests about 84% of all the gasoline taxes on road and infrastructure development.
I would like to ask the member, since he talked about taxes in his speech, about GST being charged on taxes. The way the government calculates the price on gasoline, all the taxes are added up and then it charges GST. Those taxes are neither goods nor services.
Can he justify the government ripping Canadians off by charging GST on taxes?