Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my new colleague to the House on his speech. I want to ask him specifically about a couple of things I thought were missing from the Speech from the Throne and see if he might have a few facts as to where he thinks the government may be going. He spoke a couple of times about opportunities for youth. The Speech from the Throne specifically addressed families in a lot of cases, that these were the priorities of Canadian families.
One of the key priorities for Canadian families is education, education in the public schools, but also post-secondary education. Many Canadian families, I am sure the hon. member would agree, are worried about how they will afford to send their children for post-secondary education, be it to university, community college, apprenticeship training or whatever.
The last government made great strides in research and innovation, taking Canada from the lowest in the G-7 to the top of the G-7 in publicly funded research. The issue now has become access to education. How will students afford a post-secondary degree.
We introduced things like millennium scholarships and the learning bonds, and last year in the economic update we introduced an expansion of the Canada access grants for Canadians most in need, which would be disabled Canadians, aboriginal Canadians as well as Canadians from low income families. In the campaign, it became an issue when we introduced a 50-50 plan to assist all Canadian families with education.
In light of the fact that education is such a priority, and the word “education” did not show up in the Speech from the Throne, I wonder if the hon. member might be able to share with me what he thinks the government will be doing to help Canadian students get post-secondary education.