Mr. Speaker, yesterday in the House, the Minister of Public Works and Government Services told us that he did not want public arena negotiations about compensating Quebec for having harmonized its tax. Yet the Minister of Finance himself sent the media a letter in which he laid out his conditions—the reasons he hopes to avoid compensating Quebec to the tune of $2.6 billion.
Will the minister acknowledge that his demand that the province turn tax collection over to the federal government is just an excuse for not compensating Quebec?