Mr. Speaker, I appreciated the speech by my colleague, who, as we can see, is passionate about balancing the budget.
Unfortunately, when it came time to balance its budget, the Canadian government far too often did so by cutting transfer payments to the provinces. That was the case in 1996 and in 1997, to the tune of $2.5 billion. I remember it well. It did the same thing in 1997 and 1998 by cutting $2.5 billion in transfer payments to the provinces, especially in health.
We know that getting out of this crisis will be tough. I have two quick questions for my colleague.
Does he agree with the rather shameful strategy of reducing transfer payments to the provinces to balance the budget?
Does he agree with the request from all the provincial premiers to increase health transfers to 35%?