Mr. Speaker, I thank the members in the House for having such great confidence in me, in spite of the campaign that my colleague for Carleton launched as well. I was very thankful, Mr. Speaker, that you did not have to cast the deciding vote.
I am very thankful for the support of government members, but I think they are going to be disappointed here in the next few minutes, just as Canadians have been disappointed in the last year that they have had to face the consequences of having elected the government across from us.
Certainly this has been a long year. The economy has slowed down and obviously it is affecting Canadians across the country. I want to talk a little bit about my area—