Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my colleague's intervention today. In reference to the Conservative Party, I heard him say that “What we advocate then is having a plant to control spending” and that the Conservatives would spend nothing beyond available revenues.
If we look at the Conservative record, 16 of the last 19 budgets introduced by Conservatives ran deficits. Of the three that did not run deficits, one came on the heels of a $13 billion surplus that Paul Martin left, and the other came in 2015 when they sold the shares of GM, cut EI, and did whatever they possibly could before an election to make it look as though they had balanced the budget. As a matter of fact, if we add up the amount of debt accumulated by this country over the last 151 years, we see that the Conservatives racked up 73% of that debt while being in power only 38% of the time.
My question for the member is very simple. In what world does he live if he actually thinks that the Conservative Party has any bearing to stand and preach on fiscal responsibility, when the facts just do not support that over the last 151 years?