Congratulations, Mr. Speaker, on your appointment to that great position.
The member talked in such a negative fashion about our country and the prospects for our wonderful country, which surprised me and disappointed me.
He talked about the throne speech and mentioned nothing at all about the fact that this government has been preparing for more than two years for some type of downturn in the economy.
The Prime Minister and the government did not know that financial institutions would collapse as they did. No one could have known that. This preparation has put Canada in a better position than almost any other country to deal with this difficulty before us.
Over the past couple of days Germany has lowered its value-added tax. Our government did that more than two years ago.
Over the past couple of days president-elect Obama has indicated that he will follow through with the tax cuts put in place by President Bush, something that our government has done over the past two and a half years.
Why did the member mention nothing about how well the government had prepared Canada for this situation compared to other world economic powers?