Mr. Speaker, I have had the pleasure of sitting with my colleague on the finance committee.
Everybody knows that there is a wide ideological gap between the Conservative Party and the New Democratic Party, but there are some things on which we agree. I do remember, for example, the long crusade of my colleague Pat Martin, the former MP for Winnipeg Centre, for the abolition of the penny. We saw that measure in a previous Conservative budget.
Another element on which we can agree is the tax reduction for small and medium-sized businesses. The NDP introduced this commitment back in its 2008 platform, and in 2011 as well. We also did it in 2015. The Conservatives, once again, in a previous budget announced the gradual decrease of the tax on small businesses from 11% to 9%. The Liberals followed suit during the 2015 campaign. It is never too late to board the train. They said that they would also decrease that tax to 9%. What do we find in this budget? The Liberals have kept the first tax cut to 10.5% and cancelled the rest. This is clearly a broken promise by the Liberal government, and it will cost small and medium-sized businesses $2.2 billion.
I would like to hear my hon. colleague's comments on this.