Mr. Speaker, I look forward to listening to my colleagues from the provinces and the territories later today when we meet about what ideas they may have.
However, for the member opposite, in terms of a surplus, yes, we have an operating surplus, but we have a public debt in Canada, built up in the seventies, eighties and nineties, of well in excess of $400 billion. It is like saying, “I have a big mortgage on the house, but I got a raise at work and therefore I shouldn't be paying down the mortgage”.
This is just an operating surplus. We have a large public debt and we are committed to paying it down.