Mr. Speaker, in his latest budget, the Minister of Finance anticipated a $4 billion surplus for the current year. However, yesterday the The Fiscal Monitor , which is the official publication of the Department of Finance, mentioned that, for the first five months of the current year alone, the budgetary surplus is already $4.7 billion. And the year is not over yet; there are seven months left.
Is this not once again the government's well worn strategem of hiding its budgetary surpluses from the public to avoid any debate on a use for them?