Mr. Chair, on my first occasion to rise in this hon. House, I too would like to congratulate my colleagues on both sides of the House on winning the election. I would like to extend my thanks to the constituents in my riding of Cambridge and in North Dumfries for their confidence in my abilities to effectively represent them here in the House.
I would like to ask the hon. member a question. In February the Conservative Party made substantive proposals to nip this problem in the bud, proposals that would perhaps not have solved it but would have decreased the effect on Canadians. Of course they were not taken up by the government and the situation was allowed to worsen. Farmers began losing their farms, their homes and their livelihood.
I have met with some of the farmers in my riding and I am here to tell members that those in the North Dumfries area of my riding are telling me that the government has been negligent on acting in this crisis. Not only are these farmers losing their farms, but they have made a decision to sell generational farms that have been in their families for many generations.
The reason they are doing this is that they do not see any light at the end of the tunnel: nothing that the government has proposed, none of the announcements and none of the so-called plans. Despite the rhetoric from that side of the House, they have no confidence and they are giving up. These farms will never be returned to productivity.
I would like to ask my hon. friend if he feels that any Liberal government could be trusted with a contingency fund.