Madam Speaker, I salute my colleague, who I saw in my riding barely two years ago, when he was participating in an activity of the Abitibi-Témiscamingue conference of prefects.
Indeed, the federal government has a role to play because we pay half of our taxes to Ottawa. In my view, the share Quebec receives is totally insufficient. It is the Government of Quebec that is incurring expenditures related to the current pandemic. We are talking about a 35% increase in health transfers because health spending is carried out by Quebec.
The federal government's responsibility to help the provinces in the context of the pandemic would have been to simply close the borders. It is a responsibility that it has not taken and is still slow to take. The provinces are waiting for that to happen. Yesterday, Ontario decided to take its own initiative because it was tired of waiting for Ottawa to act.
I am not even talking about vaccines or other issues that are undermining our economy. The federal government must meet its responsibilities if it wants to ensure the development of the regions.