Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my Conservative colleague on getting a jump on his election speech. It is clear that he is planning to criticize the Liberals and play up what his party has done. But I believe that a responsible government should stop talking about other parties and talk about what it wants to do.
In his speech, he referred to 37% or 38% of Canadians. Those figures certainly do not include Quebec. He could never say that in Quebec, because we have a very good child care system.
What is more, the $1,200 parents receive annually is not a complete gift. Much of it comes back to the government in taxes. The member spoke of choice, but this amount does not give parents the choice of child care in the evening, on weekends or when they want it. Child care centres do not exist simply because the government is giving people money for child care. That is the big problem.
Quebec already has child care centres. The government is giving us $258 million. That hurts the province, because the money is being given to the people, who are not necessarily paying for child care.
Since Quebec already has a child care system, how is it that he did not support it earlier, when the other provinces considered it a model system?