Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his speech, although it bore a great resemblance to a long string of heckles.
The member talked about $7 billion, which does not have any real purpose in the budget. I happened to sit in in the government operations committee, so I would have to disagree with him. Very serious questions were asked. We asked officials what it really meant if we voted for $7 billion now? The officials said we could ask questions about it later.
That is not the way it is supposed to work in Parliament. We are asked to approve measures. We know what they are and we vote for or against them based on what is going to happen.
The member's analogy with the members' office budgets proves he has not looked very closely at his own budget. Our budgets are itemized. We know what the dollars are are for. We know what we can spend them on.
I would ask the member to think again about this request in the budget for members of Parliament to give a blank cheque of $7 billion to Liberals and only ask about it later.