Mr. Speaker, since this is the first time on my feet in the 39th Parliament I would like to extend my thanks to my constituents for returning me to this place. I am deeply honoured and hope I live up to the trust they have placed in me.
For the most part, I agree with what the member for Beaches—East York had to say. I thought it was interesting that the member specifically talked about cities. Being from Toronto, of course, the hon. member would know the importance of a city's agenda.
It took 12 years to get to the point where the federal Liberals finally acknowledged that one cannot have healthy regional, provincial and federal economies without having healthy local, municipal economies. They were finally ready to start putting some money there, many thanks to the NDP budget, Bill C-48, which actually flowed serious money into that agenda.
The member's interim leader said in the past that the Liberals would be absolutely opposed to anything the government did and that they would vote against it. If, through negotiation, we could actually get something in front of this House that advanced the cities' agenda in a serious way, would the Liberals step down from this petulant position and be prepared to vote and actually pass legislation that would help cities or will they just continue with their arms crossed, holding their breath, stamping their feet, saying they want to be back in government and that until that changes they are not prepared to do anything positive?