Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech and his questions. I know he is a member in this House who always does his homework.
In the brief time I have remaining, let me try to deal with each of the issues he has raised.
I do not think he has ever heard me, in this place or in public, accuse the government of “extreme” austerity, but clearly the government is focused on austerity. We have seen cuts take place in program after program, and over the years tens of billions of dollars have gone out of government spending. In our program growth, we are not keeping pace with population growth or with inflation. I think our programs are increasingly focused on an approach to Canadian families that is more in keeping with Leave It to Beaver from the 1950s than it is with the modern family of today.
Therefore, clearly, we are on a path of austerity, but not to same degree as Europe. I give him that.
I did not say I opposed the skilled trades student loan program; my criticism of it is that it is a very small measure to deal with youth unemployment. I am a big fan of the trades and I would like to see a big expansion of skilled trades programs. This is a very tiny measure to that end.
With respect to immigration, I know the member who asked the question is a former immigration minister and knows that dossier well. All I can say is do not get me started, because it is a huge issue in my riding, where families have to wait years for family reunification.
There was the tragedy we have seen of many members of our Roma community losing their ability to stay in Canada and being sent back to very unsafe conditions when they were seeking refugee status here. As well, we have very serious concerns about the ability of people to get their documents dealt with by the current government in a timely fashion.
We have huge problems in our immigration system. We would have liked to have seen a more comprehensive approach to immigration, one that would actually help immigrants who come to this country and one that would get their cases dealt with in a timely fashion.