Madam Speaker, the hon. member for Mercier was very passionate in her defence of small business people. I certainly appreciate her passion.
However, I wonder whether she has her priorities just a little skewed. The parts of the bill that we do not like are not about small entrepreneurs. They are about big banks and making their lives easier.
These 85% loan guarantees are not meant to be of benefit to the borrower. These are of benefit to the lender. I am sure the hon. member for Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre agrees with me on this point. It is probably the only thing in the world on which we agree.
We do not have to make the world safe for Matthew Barrett. This is exactly what we are doing. If we were to amend this piece of legislation to remove any reference whatsoever to lending money to people in capital leasing ventures, we would be improving the legislation because we would be lowering the risk to the taxpayer, not the risk to the banks. The banks do not take a risk. The parts of the bill we just discussed ensure that the banks are not going to get their hands burned. The only people who are going to get burned are you and me and all the other taxpayers.
As someone who was an independent businessman for most of his adult life, I find that this is unconscionable. I will go from unconscionable to obscene when I look at the provision for allowing small business loans to not for profit organizations.
Good heavens. What does this have to do with economic growth? This is just another backdoor handout by this Liberal government to people who really have no legitimate call on public funds. Of course for the Liberal government that is nothing new. There is always money for SNC Lavelin, for Bombardier and for the Desmarais family, for anybody who is really big and powerful and on the inside.