Mr. Speaker, I was a bit confused when the member spoke about a competitive advantage. Earlier the member for Windsor West talked about the advantage that General Motors, for example, sees in having a strong public health care system here in Canada as a cost per car that is incurred which is passed on to consumers.
In the member's last point he spoke about needing to get back on to a level playing field with the Americans, whereas when we look at the corporate tax rates between the two countries, we already have an advantage over the Americans because we are already lower. The member might be confusing his points of rhetoric.
The second part deals with fiscal responsibility toward the taxpayer. We ran some numbers recently and it is quite expensive to maintain the House on any given day. It is approximately $700,000 according to House of Commons officials. The Conservative and Bloc protest a couple of weeks ago cost us somewhere between $1.4 and $2.1 million to achieve we are not even sure what.
In terms of fiscal responsibility, I am wondering if the member would consider proposing a motion to his caucus members asking them not to accept their pay for at least those days in which they did not work and did not show up at committee. It seems reasonable and fiscally sound to say that if one is going to go on strike, which is the right of any worker in Canada, one does not expect to get paid for those days on strike by the company that does the hiring.
Could the member also answer the question relating to competitive advantage? As we have already gone through $100 billion worth of tax cuts over the last decade, what exactly is the member looking for?