Mr. Speaker, my colleague opposite talks about where resources are coming from. This government has ensured that we have put into place resources that can handle the services required by Canadians in a variety of areas. When he talks about EI changes or immigration changes, for example, these are the exact places where the government has looked to find inefficiencies and waste, so we can better use the money the taxpayers provide this government with to provide those services, so the services are going to be there to provide Canadians with what they need.
However, as I listen to my hon. colleague it is so disappointing to hear the Liberal Party. When those members talk about job numbers, they twist the job numbers and talk down to Canadian workers in a way that is really offensive to them.
The economy of Canada is doing well. As I listen to my colleague, for whom I have tremendous respect, when we talk about job numbers it is important to know the facts, so I will present some facts for him.
In recent years, Canada, like the rest of the world, was impacted by the worst global recession since World War II, and our economy has been stronger than all other countries in the G7. With the assistance of our Conservative government's economic action plan, Canada has created nearly 700,000 net new jobs since July 2009. This is the strongest growth in employment among all G7 countries. Ninety per cent of those nearly 700,000 jobs have been full-time positions and more than three-quarters of them have been in the private sector employment regions.
In March alone, I should point out that Canada created an incredible 80,000 net new jobs. Those job numbers were so positive that even the Canadian Labour Congress, which is not traditionally an ally of our Conservative government, was forced to applaud them. It said, “We are very pleased to see that the number of full-time jobs increased in March”. One would hope that the Liberal Party of Canada could show the same type of positivity as the Canadian economy grows stronger.
Looking back to 2006 when our Conservative government first took office, the picture gets even better. Since that time, employment in Canada has increased by more than 1.1 million jobs. That is more than one million more Canadians working today than under the former Liberal government. Again, despite the constant bashing by the Liberals, Canada has had the strongest performance of any G7 country since 2006, and the list just goes on.
On economic growth, both the IMF and OECD forecast that we will have among the strongest economic growth in the G7 in the years ahead. On our financial sector, the World Economic Forum has for the fourth straight year rated our banking system the absolute best in the world. On our fiscal situation, Canada has and will continue to have by far the lowest total government debt-to-GDP ratio in the entire G7, based on IMF projections. On fiscal and economic fundamentals, Canada's credit rating is, bar none, one of the best. Moody's, Fitch and Standard & Poor's have affirmed that Canada, unlike numerous other countries, has the highest possible rating by major agencies on our competitiveness, while Forbes, the influential business magazine, ranked Canada as the best country in the world for businesses to grow and create jobs, due primarily to our low-tax plan for Canadian businesses.
What we are not going to do is what is suggested by the Liberal Party: raise corporate taxes, put more increases into CPP, enforce a carbon tax and have an EI 45-day work year. These are things Canadians cannot tolerate and cannot afford and would put our country into some dire straits. We will not do that, and I would hope that our Liberal colleague would listen to some of these benefits and perhaps support us on them as we create more and more jobs.