Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the hon. member for Newmarket—Aurora. He indicated that tax credits like the sports and fitness tax credit had to be eliminated in order to pay for the fiscal measures, the tax plan, of the Liberal Party. However, during the last election campaign when Liberals went to Canadians to ask for their votes, that is not what they told them. They told them that they were going to pay for it through a number of specified measures: the elimination of the universal child care benefit, which they are doing, the establishment of a new high tax bracket, which they have done, and the elimination of income splitting, which is also happening. All of those tax grabs were going to take place. That was going to finance their plan, and that was it.
Nowhere in their platform did they say anything about eliminating the sports and fitness tax credit for children or eliminating the children's arts credit. No, they did not tell Canadians that. They did not tell Canadians that they planned to eliminate the textbook tax credit. They did not tell Canadians they planned to eliminate the education tax credit. All of those things were to be untouched. They were not necessary to pay for this plan. However, today we are hearing a new tune, that they actually were necessary to pay for their plan.
Why is it that they told Canadians something totally different about the tax hikes they had in mind during the election campaign and then hit them with a surprise whole second set of tax hikes after the election to pay for promises Conservatives had said were not affordable?