Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the member for Central Nova for his presentation. He raised one area about which I have great concern, and that is the surpluses. A piece written by Greg Weston in the media this morning talked somewhat about this, in other words collect money now and then decide later how it will spend it.
Mr. Weston referred to the Auditor General criticizing a recent report of $9 billion being put into foundations. With this budget, there will be another $5 billion stashed away in surplus, and this will all be decided later. That is $14 billion which will be stashed away.
For health care, $4.2 billion will put in a wait-in-times reduction trust. For child care, $5 billion will put away. For defence strategy, $13 billion in defence will be put away, although the budget describes where some of it will go. However, we do not where the bulk of the money will go.
Should the ministers be given the discretion to spend this money without debate in the House?