Mr. Speaker, the member made an interesting comment before his question. He said that everything seems to be good. He referred to all of these factors that seemed to be good but the fact is that the financial outlook is not nearly that good.
Sadly, Canada has become a non-player in the world. It is not the fault of the Canadian people because they are great people. It is the fault of the Canadian government.
When I attended a meeting of the NATO parliamentarians in February, I went to Paris to a meeting of the OECD, one of the most respected think tanks and research groups in the world. We received an economic forecast from them for the next couple of years. The forecast itself was not that positive. In fact, we have been on a declining schedule for some time when it comes to the economic forecast, but something was even more disturbing than that. In all of the information that was given to the NATO parliamentarians who attended the meeting, the numbers presented were for the G-6, not the G-7 and not the G-8.
The G-7 still includes Canada but we have become such a non-player that all of the numbers were for the G-6 with Canada not included. That is a sad commentary of what the government has done to our country over the past many years. I do not think the members across the floor should be laughing at what they have done to our country because it is not the people of the country, it is the government that has done that.