Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for a well thought out and well researched debate on the budget. I am not sure which budget we are talking about, the first or the second one, but I would like to ask the member two questions.
First, would he acknowledge that in fact the NDP has recently announced that it too supports separating out the Atlantic accord so that we can do the right thing for Atlantic Canada? That is unlike what the Liberals want to do, which is to tie it up into the first budget, which has 24 parts. We were quite willing to negotiate out each of those individual parts to make them better for Canada, unlike the Liberal Party. Was the member aware of that?
Second, how does he feel about this second budget, which appears to be a knee-jerk reaction to the possibility that the government will fall, a reaction out of a desperation to hang onto power? A knee-jerk reaction led to the conclusion that brought us the gun registry. Also, when the Liberal government heard of children sniffing gasoline, the knee-jerk reaction was to move them to another place and ultimately the problem went with them at a cost of $400,000 per person. Therefore, how does the member feel about knee-jerk reactions?