heard the same nashing of teeth and the same peach -- same speech phiing from this party. what has he done for the quebec in the last 20 years? nothing. zero. >> order, please. order. >> the honorable member for -- >> mr. speaker, we don't live on our knees. we live standing up. this conservative government couldn't care less about quebec. nothing stopped it from the tax harm nighization, but they are just fooling around here in ottawa. if the government wanted to avoid elections, all it had to do was compensate quebec to the tune of $2.2 billion. doesn't the prime minister realize his indifference to quebec will provoke elections and quebecers will decide. the honorable minister of finance. >> order. >> we've had good discussions with the government of quebec, the minister of finance of quebec. regarding the h.s.c. we hope it will have an agreement very soon. we will continue our talks. with the quebec government, the honorable -- >> mr. speaker, they have been fooling around here for 20 years. they continue to help the wealthy, and tax cuts are maintained for oil companies. the bank

health care connector. it is simpler to the changes that will be created under the nash -- the national health insurance in each state. each state will create an exchange. massachusetts did that in the connector. there is a new state plan that will cover people up to 300% of the poverty level. that is about $15,000 per individual. they do not have to pay any premiums. the individual mandate warranted? yes, it is affordable. they are lower income and there's no premium. there is a sliding scale of up to 300% of the poverty level. that is how it extends insurance to lower-income people. the national reform will do it in a different way. there will be an exchange, but then there will be tax incentives that are provided up to 400% of the poverty level. another thing that the state did was expand medicaid programs. medicaid is the federal-state program that covers low-income people, people with disabilities. the way that the state got to the 98% coverage was that this new program, commonwealth care, covered in the newly insured, expansions into medicaid which was another 18% and the balance

and yet many of the people here in washington are wailing and weeping and nashing of teeth, those sorts of things that catastrophe just awaits us because we cut spending by .06. i think that the looming economic crisis in 2037 is the more important point, that our economy will cease to function at that point. you can go online and look at c.b.o. or o.m.b. to find that chart. that's where we pulled it from. so take a look at it. but the important thing is to understand that no company, my wife and i ran a small company and no company ever found itself in fiscal straits like this and cured it simply by cutting spending. i don't think that it's possible for us to cut spending from $3.5 trillion to $to.2 trillion. as a businessperson it doesn't seem true. if we can't cut that much spending, you have to say, how to we get the $2.2 trillion to move toward the $3.5 trillion. if we can't cut spending enough, how do we grow revenues? some people say, we should raise taxes. that should be -- they would say we should raise taxes and then you should have to ask, what's the jut come of raising

budget, if do you think it might be time to reevaluate the number of a master of -- nash -- national laboratories, and begin to come up with a plan to reorganize and consolidate them? >> you are right. that is tough. i would say that before we do that, there is a lot of things we can do to look at how we can get real efficiency in what we do. even though the president and i firmly believe that the department of energy will play a critical role in guaranteeing the future prosperity of the united states in its research and development, if we do also recognize that we have to look to gain efficiencies wherever we can, and to streamline what we do, knowing that ultimately the money that we give to universities, off two national laboratories, and to help research in businesses, that is our real job. if the other structures are there to make sure we do this in the most responsible and intelligent ways possible. we'll be working very hard to look at how we can increase those deficiencies. >> well, i support the national laboratories, but i think we ought to begin to reevaluate them in light

? the coalition question came about five or six times in rapid said nash -- succession. >> i think he came roaring out of the gate. he was presented with that -- they must have anticipated that this was going to be one of the first couple of questions, if not the first one. when he did not answer it and it kept coming back at him, this is really where we are seeing the difference between jack layton, and we all know that during election campaigns, some really weird stuff can happen. if you or not right there to respond to it well, it cannot derail your campaign very quickly. as peter said, this is a question that will come back to him, and quite rightly so. canadians have a right to know whether they are voting for liberals or a liberal in an alliance of some sort. >> in the last comment on what you heard from the leaders? >> not to belabor the point of a coalition, but ignatieff did not answer the question the other day when he talked about the red door and the blue door. they are going to have to come up with a better answer than what he gave here, and that will have to come up with