Mr. Speaker, the debate today is certainly going to be interesting, but I cannot help but respond to the member's reference on the budget planning process. He seemed to take umbrage with the fact that the government has had a surplus this year, last year and the previous year.
Would he not accept that the existence of a surplus involves two separate things? The first is that it is a legitimate part of the budget planning process, whereby we do not plan to have a deficit; we plan to do better than break even. When we spend $150 billion a year, trying to get that dollar right on the money is difficult, and this government has decided to err on the side of caution and build in contingencies so we will inevitably end up with a surplus rather than a deficit. I think Canadians are happy with that. The second point is that every bit of our surplus, whatever it happens to be, and if there is one, gets applied to the national debt, which is a little heavy. We are making good progress on it.
Would he not accept those two elements in the budget planning process and would he not accept that his criticism of a surplus is a little over the top and a little unfair to Canadians?