Mr. Speaker, the appointment of the new Minister of Finance does not bode well for Quebeckers.
Since he was the former executive director of the Ontario Securities Commission, it is very likely that he will pursue his predecessor's desire to create a Canada-wide securities commission and that he will continue attempts to take away Quebec's jurisdiction to benefit Toronto.
Furthermore, his ties to the oil industry and his attempts to reduce environmental requirements are well known, which means that we could end up seeing measures that are even more lenient towards the big oil companies.
By calling those who are opposed to blindly increasing oil sands production radicals, he has proven once again that our public finances will be managed based on ideology instead of fact.