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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent for his question. I appreciate our conversations, although we unfortunately do not get to talk as often anymore.

As for his question, if the government must run a deficit, the deficit must at least serve a purpose. If the government is running a deficit in order to invest in something that will ultimately provide a return on investment, that could be positive. This is what the Liberals promised during the election campaign. They said that they would run deficits in order to invest in infrastructure.

Over time, the premise has changed. The government is investing less and less in infrastructure, even as it is running higher deficits than it had planned. The government is trying to skirt its promise by creating the infrastructure bank, which will hold funds, like the Caisse de dépôt et de placement du Québec, but will also hold investments from Saudi Arabia, Australia, China, and Qatar. At the end of the day, these investors will be deciding what to invest in, since they will hold about 80% of the capital. If we need to build a bridge or a highway, this fund, and not the communities in need, will decide what is a priority.

This is a big problem, because this is not what the Liberals had promised during the election campaign. Canadians did not vote to gradually lose control over our infrastructure.

Guy Caron

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