Mr. Speaker, the member is correct. The truth is that we took on a deficit at a time of global recession, and we said we would do it to stimulate the economy. However, the interesting thing was the measures we took to stimulate the economy.
While experts are saying they cannot see evidence in this budget of programs that will create jobs or stimulate the economy, we, at a cost of several billion dollars, introduced the home renovation tax credit. That stimulated the economy, as people spent money in their communities and invested in their own homes. It was an expensive initiative, but it was time limited. It did its job, and it put a lot of money into the economy.
We coupled that with tax breaks for small businesses and for Canadians, things like introducing the hiring tax credit for small businesses. All of these things generated economic stimulus, and, of course, that resulted in more revenue for the government. It allowed us then to see growth. We had the highest growth record in the G7. That then allowed us to increase our transfers to the provinces for health care by 70%, increasing our transfers to Ontario by 89%.
We lowered taxes, and we were still able to be compassionate in our programming. We raised the funding for the kinds of things that Canadians need most. It is possible, and we will urge the government to take the same path.