Mr. Speaker, I thought I was clear on that point. What I said when I touched briefly on the historical background is important and I look forward to seeing the Liberals' position on this issue.
The Minister of Finance said he would compensate Quebec if the tax were fully harmonized. Since that time, he keeps inventing new conditions that he knows full well Quebec will never accept. Among other things, the finance minister set a requirement, and he even did it publicly. A letter published in the newspapers said that Quebec would receive compensation only if both the GST and the QST were collected by the federal government from now on. This is totally unacceptable.
There is another aspect to the commitment made by the Minister of Finance. He said that, previously, provinces were to be compensated only if they stood to lose more than 5% of their tax revenues because of harmonization. Now we know that Ontario will see its revenues increase with a harmonized tax.