Mr. Speaker, I will answer that by just telling a bit of an anecdotal story. Yesterday I was in the Pearson airport and I decided to get my shoes shined. As the gentleman was shining my shoes, he noticed I was reading the paper and said, “Is there anything in the budget for me?” I looked down at him and I said, “Actually, I see right here where they have eliminated income tax for shoe shining”. He of course did not believe me, and it is a good thing he did not.
I would run on more than this budget, were I running. Frankly, I would run on a record of 10 years under the former prime minister. I know he is taking a beating in the media right now on all of the various scandals, but I can say and will say to my children and my grandchildren that I was proud to be part of the cabinet, part of the team, and part of the caucus of that particular government under that particular prime minister.
I would run in the next election on the fact that we should celebrate the record. Yes, we had some problems. Yes, there were some mistakes. There appears to have been possibly even criminal activity that took place. This is a large institution. The current Prime Minister has said he will get to the bottom of it. I trust that he will. I trust him explicitly. I believe the Canadian people do as well. I would run on the overall package.
This budget, frankly, is a little what I would call typical of what I might have expected out of the current Minister of Finance, who is very small c conservative, careful and prudent. That is important, but let us run on the successes and let us stand and say we are proud to be Liberals, we are proud to have been the government of this great country, and this country has become great as a result of a lot of the work of the men and women who have been part of the last 10 years in this government.