Mr. Speaker, this is an important debate. The member is quite right about the commitment that President Barack Obama has made in the U.S. He understands it, he gets it, whereas our government does not.
I have often said in this place that the measure of success of a country is not really an economic measure but rather a measure of the health and well-being of its people, and the health and well-being of its people depends a lot on whether or not we are dealing with the challenges that people face. I am thinking, specifically, about a mental health disease such as Alzheimer's and the promise that stem cell research brings to that particular area of affliction of many Canadians.
Yet, we have seen in fact that research funding for the sciences and health has actually gone down at the universities. We had a brain gain from 2002 to 2007, but now we are seeing that our best and brightest are leaving for the United States and for countries like Australia. I think it causes some alarm for the research community and it should for this Parliament.
I wonder if the member agrees that the government's commitment to research and innovation is a failure.