Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his passionate speech. We are definitely going to need a history lesson to set the record straight.
My colleague said that the Conservatives left us a balanced budget, but that is not at all the case. It was an artificially balanced budget because they sold GM shares just before the election to inflate revenues. It is important to mention that. They also fired thousands of employees who had been working on the Phoenix system, which caused and continues to cause enormous problems. They also cut veterans services, mainly by closing offices.
The important thing here is the difference between investing and spending money. Our government is investing. We are not spending money, we are investing in Canadians.
The unemployment rate has dropped from 7.2% to 5.7%. That is a big difference. There are also 700,000 more jobs in Canada than there were when the Conservatives were in power. That is because of our investments, which generate profits and revenues. That is what we are doing.
I really appreciate my colleague's argument about an artificially balanced budget.