Mr. Speaker, many of us still remember 2005, the last time the member had the opportunity to sit in government. That Liberal government's last budget implementation bill did much the same. It amended many different bills, dozens of different pieces of legislation.
Let us be clear. It is not the size of the budget legislation that the opposition cares about. It is not about which bills are in or which are not. We have had much larger budget implementation acts or bills in the past. It is that the opposition wants to stop the necessary and vital economic reforms that are in this bill.
Even though the opposition likes to suggest otherwise, it has been common practice to include various measures in a bill and in the subsequent budget implementation bill. That has been common practice. This is nothing new or groundbreaking. The opposition would have the Canadian public believe that these are extraordinary measures that have never been implemented in the past. Budget implementation bills often deal with legislation from different departments, with monies and so forth, so it is nothing that is new or groundbreaking. It simply reflects the central role of a budget to a government's agenda.
That is what this implementation act does. It brings forward the mandate and the agenda that we have to continue to bring forward positive policy that will help create jobs and build prosperity for all Canadians in a very fragile recovery.