Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague talks about empty rhetoric and then engages in a great deal of it. The fact is that we have taken action.
First of all, I should say that we really ought to be looking forward. The hon. member wants to look back and rehash the past. The fact of the matter is that her party never supported any measure taken by the previous government to get our finances in order, to get our economy stronger, measures that allowed us to have the strength we have today and that allows the present government to have a surplus of $12 billion so that it can do the things it is not doing and that we are still waiting for it to do. But at least it has the ability to do that because our economy is strong.
The member's party did nothing to assist that. It opposed every measure possible that the previous government took to get our finances in order, so how she can stand there and complain about that is beyond me.
The member talked about us doing nothing for students. She totally ignores, for example, the Canada access grants gave students $4,000 a year for the first and fourth years of university. As we can recall, her party was opposed, I guess, to the proposal we brought forward in the election of extending that to all four years.
In fact, the measures we had in the economic update in November provided $2.75 billion for education, but those members did not want to have that happen. They wanted to have an election instead and put a Conservative government in place. That was the choice. The Conservatives are obviously delighted about that, but it is remarkable to me that the NDP would be delighted about that also. That seems to me to be most peculiar in view of what they tout as their priorities.
I think we have certainly heard a fair amount of empty rhetoric in a very short time from my hon. colleague.