Mr. Chair, let us be honest. What the minister is talking about is a $10 billion to $12 billion day care bureaucracy, which will mean higher taxes for families and few choices for parents.
The minister is not being honest about the full cost of his program. In fact, all the groups that support this day care bureaucracy say that it will cost in the neighbourhood of $10 billion to $12 billion.
The New Democratic Party has said in this House of Commons, and this is the party that wrote the latest budget, that it will cost at least $10 billion.
The major groups that have researched and support the minister's day care bureaucracy say it will cost $10 billion to $12 billion.
Yet he is trying to convince the Canadian people that it will only cost $1 billion per year. Why is the minister hiding approximately $10 billion in real costs to taxpayers for his program?