Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time this afternoon with my hon. colleague, the member for Saint John—Rothesay.
It is a privilege for me to rise today to speak to extending the government's support for businesses and individuals.
Before I speak to the content of Bill C‑2, I want to highlight all of the work that the government has done throughout the pandemic to help individuals and businesses deal with the worst consequences of COVID‑19.
Our government supported Canadians, with programs including the Canada emergency response benefit, which provided support to nine million Canadians, and the Canada emergency wage subsidy, which provided support to hundreds of thousands of employees and protected millions of jobs. Our economy has recovered the jobs lost during the pandemic and our situation is much better than it would have been if the government had not intervened.
I want to take a moment to address the government's decision to take a more targeted approach. I suspect that I will be asked by some colleagues, at the end of my 10-minute speech, why the government is choosing now to move in a different direction—