Mr. Speaker, I commend my colleague on his speech. He has brought up some very good points that the House needs to be reminded of. Obviously the little bit of information that was in the throne speech acknowledged the condition that we have left the economy in.
One of the areas in which the previous Liberal government was so successful was the area of addressing the skills issues and developing Canada, specifically universities, through research and innovation. There has been $13 billion invested since 1998, taking Canada from near the bottom of the G-7 in terms of publicly funded research to a place at the very top of the G-7. Most recently, last year the government introduced specific measures to address accessibility for students, particularly those from low income families, low income Canadians.
I would like to ask my colleague a question. When we talk about “five priorities” for Canadians, would he agree with me that education might be one of those five priorities? Was he surprised to see that education was not even mentioned in the Speech from the Throne?