Mr. Speaker, what matters when we take on a debt is its amount in relation to our wealth. For example, if I have a $100,000 mortgage on a home worth $300,000, it is not the same as having a $100,000 mortgage on a $100,000 home. Everyone should understand that.
Since the Liberals began paying down the debt, it has decreased by 48% or perhaps 35% of GDP. I do not have the figures on hand, but the debt has been reduced significantly. 80% of this is due to economic growth and only 20% to debt repayment. If you use money to pay down the debt rather than investing in factors that contribute to growth, you shoot yourself in the foot, as I stated earlier. What is even worse is that the provinces are forced to go into debt. At present—with the exception of Alberta—all provinces are on roughly the same footing, with balanced budgets, or slight deficits, or very large deficits in some cases. Provincial debt is more costly for taxpayers. Does it make sense to pay down debt which costs less in terms of interest paid and to make provinces go into debt and then force them to borrow on the markets?
The Quebec debt increased by $11 billion when the Liberals were in power. I guess that they did try to prevent things from getting worse but they did not succeed, in part because of fiscal imbalance. The interest rate on that $11 billion is higher than that on the federal debt. As a taxpayer, I would prefer to see the federal debt increased by $11 billion because the interest rate on it is lower, than in the provinces that have to pay higher taxes. I think that that would be totally logical from an accounting and a financial point of view.
I am not against paying down the debt but I think it is not a priority for the present situation. Our priority should be allowing the provinces to ensure sufficient financing for their public services and their social programs. If there is money remaining after that, we could then lower taxes or make payments on the debt or a combination of both.
Right now, the fiscal imbalance has not been corrected and the dire financial situation of provincial governments is proof of that. I always find it funny to see in the documents on the financial situation of the provinces that there is a surplus of $X billion. Almost 90% of that surplus comes from Alberta. As for the others, one year things go well, the next they do not go as well. It is not helping the taxpayers to burden them with the debt that is the most expensive for them, when the federal government made a huge surplus of $13 billion last year. I think that this is simply a question of financial logic. It is not an ideological issue at all.