Mr. Speaker, I like parts of the member's speech, in particular the breadth of the issues about which he spoke. There is a number of things with which we disagree.
I want to offer my friend a number of suggestions, and I would appreciate his input on them. We both share ridings and constituencies that are on coasts. My riding is on the west coast; his is on the east coast.
My first suggestion deals with shipbuilding. I think the government ought to adopt this solution. Why does the government not take the import tax on ships purchased abroad and use that with a combined fund, to which the private sector can contribute, to help refurbish and upgrade our shipbuilding infrastructure? In other words, the government should take that import tax and rather than dump it into general revenues, put it into a shipbuilding restructuring infrastructure program that would have an equal amount of money from the private sector.
My second question deals with immigrants who are in Canada illegally and who have been here for a long time. Would his party approve of those immigrants being able to access work permits, renewable on a yearly basis? Then those people can get out from the cold, start paying taxes and ultimately, if they are able to do this over a period of years, they can apply to become citizens and be a part of our wonderful country?
My last question is on the issue of China. Is he in favour of erecting trade barriers against China? The Liberal Party is not in favour of that. It would violate many of our international agreements.
Does the hon. member think the government should invest in the elements of productivity, such as education, access to education, infrastructure, a cities agenda, which we adopted, that would allow us to make the strategic investments with other players to improve our productivity?