Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak on that point. When Jean Chrétien came to power in 1993, he inherited a bankrupt EI system. The Auditor General of Canada had instructed the prime minister at that time to put the EI system into general revenues because the unemployment rate then was 12.5%. Under Liberal rule, more jobs were created and the unemployment rate came down to 7.5%. More people were paying in, fewer people were taking out and a surplus was created.
When the Conservatives did away with EI's inclusion in general revenues, they once again created a stand-alone regime, and that system is now $9 billion in arrears. It is back to the future again. We are back to where we were: $9 billion in the hole. Here we go again.