Mr. Speaker, first I would like to thank my colleague from Beauport—Limoilou for his fine speech. I would like him to expand on his answer to the hon. member for Yukon, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources, who seemed to say in his remarks that the government should reduce its debt, and things of that sort.
The member for Beauport—Limoilou has delivered a simple message. He is telling the federal government to start looking after the facilities it has, to stop creating new parks and start maintaining the ones it already possesses.
In my riding of Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, I have a fine example. You know, as I do, Mr. Speaker, about the Carillon Canal, which was a historic concept of a canal for the transportation of wood. You come from a family that did business up and down the Ottawa River and used the canal system from Carillon to Grenville. There was one on the Ontario side as well, used for forestry. A vestige of this design remains, the Carillon Canal. Believe it or not, the latest report by the Auditor General contains a photograph of the Carillon Canal, showing the state of disrepair in which the Government of Canada has left it.
And what has been done since the Auditor General submitted her report last year? Rather than repairing the canal, they buried it. Incredible! A geotextile was laid down; the canal was filled in; and more than $200,000 was spent, with the remark, “Someday when we have the money, we will take all this away and be able to repair the canal”.
That is what things are like in the regions, because all this Liberal government wants is to have new things, put up new flags, but never take care of the facilities it already has.