Mr. Speaker, the opposition leader offered the finance minister two hours to present the fall economic statement on Monday. The minister's response was to reject the offer to provide an update that would take no more than a minute.
It is absurd that Canadians are in the dark about how dire the fiscal situation is in this country. The NDP-Liberal costly coalition has created inflationary deficits that are hurting Canadians at the grocery store, at the gas pump and in their monthly heating bills. Canadians are trying to manage household budgets while the government's inflationary deficits are costing every Canadian, as the deficits blow up uncontrollably.
Canadians were promised a $40-billion deficit cap in the spring budget. What is the real deficit number and why will the finance minister not take up the offer by the opposition leader to tell Canadians the truth in the people's House? By hiding the truth, the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister are proving once again that they cannot be redeemed at this point and must be replaced by a common-sense Conservative government that will fix the budget.
A carbon tax election cannot come soon enough.