Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the work done by my colleague, for whom I have a great deal of respect. He is a man of experience who always brings an interesting perspective to the committee. I would like to take this opportunity to thank him for his important contribution to our committee.
Like him, I am a member of the Standing Committee on Finance, together with some other colleagues who are here. We did indeed hear from a number of witnesses who said that the definition of middle class varies greatly depending on the region and the socio-economic context.
I was fortunate to travel to the north. The average salary in some areas is obviously quite different from the average in my riding of Saint-Maurice—Champlain. You will realize that when we take into account all the factors, the middle class is a concept that varies.
This is what we did. The member could at least give us credit for that. We were very clear in the last election when we indicated which tax bracket we would lower. That is exactly what we did. We said that we would lower taxes for the second bracket of the middle class from 22% to 20.5%, which applies to income of approximately $45,000 to $90,000. That is a 7% reduction. Canadians chose to elect us based on that.
I understand what my colleague said. He shared his views and we listened carefully at the Standing Committee on Finance. However, on October 19, Canadians chose a different path.