Mr. Speaker, it is not hard to balance the budget when money is gouged out of the health care system that goes to the provinces. It is not hard to balance the budget when advanced education transfers and Canada health and social transfers are slashed. It is not hard to gouge extra billions of dollars out of projected military spending and give at least some of it to Liberal friends.
It is not hard to balance the budget if Liberal priorities are wrong and taxation continues. In this case, spending is going up 7.6% again next year and 12.7% is projected--we know it will be more than that--over the next two years.
The Liberals happened to hit the 10 years of the longest sustained period of economic growth in the world--and this is no credit to the Liberals, this is a worldwide phenomena--in the last century. They happened to take government just when that long period of economic growth took place.
I am happy the budget is balanced; however, I am not particularly pleased with how they have done it. I believe that they could have had a good budget if they thought about the basics they needed to put in place in order to have long term, sustainable growth through the ups and downs and vagaries of international politics and terrorism, and whatever it might be.
It is not done by increasing the spending by the amount they are doing without also giving some long term tax relief to businesses, individuals, homemakers and others who are trying to do their part to get the economy going and to make it sustainable in the long run. That is part and parcel of doing it.
It is not done by devising programs that are subject to every kind of government waste and that road to hell of good intentions, and expect that we are going to get the economy rolling in the long term. That is not good. Balancing it on the backs of the health care system was not a good idea either.