Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle and I cannot help but believe that he is going to have a very difficult time following the record of his predecessor, the Hon. Lorne Nystrom. I hear him spewing the policies about telling everyone they are on their own and telling them they can sink or swim on their own. He says we should not worry about having modern, accountable government programs to back up our medicare system, our post-secondary education system, our environmental remediation, our child care needs and so on.
I want to ask a very specific question because I think it is important we talk about small business and the burden on small business, and what it takes for small businesses to thrive. Does he not recognize that small businesses, more than any other businesses, very much need the support that comes from a comprehensive health care system, from decent pharmacare programs and from comprehensive child care?
These are all things that many large businesses can negotiate in group plans and so on, but small businesses desperately need their families to have those kinds of supports because they cannot provide those kinds of benefits through private means, certainly not efficiently or effectively.