Mr. Speaker, as far as we are concerned, paying down the federal debt is clearly not a priority. I am not saying it is not a good thing, but until we deal with the fiscal imbalance, the priority should be to transfer the tax base, the federal government's surpluses to the provinces, to help them assume their responsibilities in their jurisdictions.
Let us not forget that paying down the debt is not as effective as promoting economic growth. What will happen if we do not help the provinces assume their responsibilities in post-secondary education? Neither Quebec nor Canada will prosper.
Recently, there was an article in the Hill Times, if I am not mistaken, in which it was said that Canadian universities do twice as much research as universities in the other G-7 countries. Therefore, if we do not restore funding for post-secondary education, universities will no longer be able to do research. This is true for Quebec, but it is also true for the rest of Canada and we will shoot ourselves in the foot, because we will jeopardize the conditions that must prevail to ensure economic growth.
This is why I have nothing against paying down the debt when the issue comes up. Over the past eight or nine years, the Liberals have paid down the debt at the expense of conditions that promote economic growth. We are beginning to feel it very clearly considering that, for the month of February alone, 33,000 jobs were lost in Quebec's manufacturing sector. Why? Because research and development are insufficient. This is true in Quebec, but it is also true in the rest of Canada. There is not enough occupational training, because of a lack of funding.
There is nothing in the Budget Plan 2007 for post-secondary education. The document refers to an amount of $800 million, but it is for next year. We need the money now.
If we really want to reduce the debt, we must do so based on our collective wealth, which is measured by using the gross domestic product. The GDP increases with economic growth which, in turn, depends on our ability to innovate, be competitive and have adequate infrastructures. Unfortunately, our infrastructures are not only increasingly obsolete, but they also jeopardize our economic prosperity and even people's lives, as we saw with the overpass on Laval's Concorde boulevard, in Quebec.
In this sense, it would be better to correct the fiscal imbalance, to allow Quebec and the other provinces to assume their responsibilities in priority areas that are essential to economic growth.