Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to the speech given by the minister, and I want to thank him for being honest and plain-spoken. I do not know whether he realized that, at the start of his speech, he said in French, “promesses faites, promesses retenues”. I just want to remind him that when a promise is “retenue”, it means it is not kept.
That is exactly what the unemployed got with regard to EI: “promesses faites, promesses retenues”. That is exactly what happened, too, with regard to sharing the wealth. The riding I represent has many expectations about many things, in different areas. The motto here too is “promesses faites, promesses retenues”.
With regard to government transparency, the unfortunate conclusion is also “promesses faites, promesses retenues”. I repeat, in French, “retenir” means to forget and not to implement.
With regard to the fiscal imbalance, too, Quebec and the provinces are being strangled, “promesses faites, promesses retenues”.
I want to thank the minister for his honesty and give him the opportunity to tell us more about the reasons why many of the promises made by this Liberal government were retained and therefore not kept.