Mr. Speaker, as a former banker, I can certainly agree with the hon. member that our banks are in good shape, although I may take a bit of exception to his somewhat triumphalist tone.
However, my main point is to suggest that to the extent our banks are in good shape it has everything to do with previous Liberal governments and nothing at all to do with the Conservative Party. For one thing, it was the Liberal government that resisted the trend to bank deregulation which was evident in the U.S. and the U.K. It was the Liberal government that said no to bank merges which the Conservatives favoured. And it was the Conservatives who introduced zero down payment, 40 year mortgages in 2006.
Would the member agree that while our banks are in good shape, it really has nothing to do with his party, which has been more a cause of the problem than a solution?