Industry committee  Yes, absolutely.

Industry committee  Well, I would say you have to be pretty sure that they're going to pay off. I'd hate to just give a blanket yes and no, because of course you can build bridges and roads to nowhere, and they can be real white elephants to the taxpayer. You have to make sure that what you're doing is you're providing the infrastructure that's needed for economic development.

Industry committee  There might be. I wouldn't want to prejudge geophysical surveys and things like that. I'm just making the general point that you can't just say yes or no, because you can waste a lot of money building roads and bridges where the economic payoff isn't there. But likewise, you can forego an awful lot of money that we should be earning by not having the infrastructure there when the demand is there.

Industry committee  Generally, the countries that have gone on a floating exchange rate have done better. And back to your other one, countries that have gone into freer trade have done better than those that haven't. Countries that have gone towards more market systems have done better than others.

Industry committee  Yes, I definitely have. I'm glad you asked. I guess the first thing I would say is that while you say “tied to”, I think we either go into a common North American currency or we don't do it. We don't do the peg thing, and that's a long story. Should we have a common North American currency?

Industry committee  Yes. The Canadian dollar has gained relative to every major currency, but less so with the euro than others.

Industry committee  No. All the federal government can do, unfortunately—I'm sad to tell you this—is redistribute the taxpayers' money. That money didn't grow within the federal government; you collected it from taxpayers. That's why I'm saying there are better things that could have been done with it.

Industry committee  As I said, I don't think we should be changing taxes in response to where the dollar happens to be. We should be changing taxes relative to how our taxes compare. They don't compare that favourably with some of the European countries on new investment, for example. The dollar is pretty volatile.

Industry committee  Ten years? Well, I've stretched my chart into 2009, but I think even ten years out I would still see it roughly there. But I have to say, that forecast, of course, as you appreciate, requires you to have a view on where energy prices are going. That's one of the reasons why forecasting the dollar is so difficult.

Industry committee  When I say I'm not in favour, I'm saying “relative to other tax cuts”. If money fell from heaven, I'd be in favour of a GST cut. But there are better things that we could have done with that money. That's the point.

Industry committee  On your first point, our manufacturing sector should be smaller. It is smaller in the U.S. and they have a very vibrant, healthy, rich economy. So we shouldn't think that the Canadian economy would not be able to perform well if the manufacturing sector were smaller than it is today.

Industry committee  The government should set a good tax and regulatory environment. There are a lot of things they could do, not just for manufacturing but for the whole business sector, like have a good competition policy environment, and all of those sorts of things. They should not go in and pick winners and losers.

Industry committee  No, not by changing corporate income taxes.

Industry committee  They're changing the tax environment and companies' tax status will vary from year to year. In any given year, some people are going to benefit more because they are in a tax position and others aren't, but the next year the picture could be reversed.

Industry committee  In a given year, but next year it could be reversed.