Mr. Speaker, I hardly think New Democrats need to be lectured by a Liberal on environmental action. When the member's government was turfed out of office, emissions had gone up 25%, even more than those emissions under the Bush administration in the United States.
While I appreciate the member's more gentle comments at the beginning, when he congratulated me on my comments about vulnerable people in our communities, let me also use this opportunity to remind members that I have in fact done my research. We have talked to seniors in our communities. They are telling us that they are hurting more each day because their pensions, their fixed incomes, are not keeping up with things like increased property taxes, which would have been helped with some significant investment into municipal infrastructure. They are also being hurt by rising energy prices. With the cut of the EnerGuide program, these seniors have no hope of reducing those costs. We have to remember that public pensions have not been improved in any significant way.
As a House, we owe it to those individuals who built our country, who built our health care system, to ensure that they can retire with the dignity and respect they deserve.