Madam Speaker, that is a very important question. We have heard what the all-round Conservative champion, the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities has had to say about this.
When he gets to the House, the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities takes great delight in having everyone hear and see him pointing at his colleagues to announce “Your project has been approved. And yours. And yours.”
Recently, when he met with a group involved with urban mass transit, he told them straight out that cities like Montreal and Toronto—since there are zero Conservatives in Montreal and Toronto—can just sit back down and forget it, because there will be nothing coming their way. That is nothing but patronage, and what I would call a slush fund. This is why it is so scandalous that the Liberals are continuing to back the Conservatives up on this. It is very clear that, as far as the Conservative government is concerned, this is a great opportunity for pure unadulterated patronage. A person might think we were back in the Duplessis era.
The government is starting to adopt the attitude that, since the official opposition is nothing but a bunch of lapdogs and puppets that will let them do anything they want to them, why not take advantage of that. So that is what they are doing. They are going to set up a nice little fund for themselves and their little pals, $3 billion in hard cash just for them and their cronies. The Liberals will stand up and exclaim about how terrible it all is, but then they will vote in favour.