Catholic Church with the bishop of Calgary warning in a sermon that Chrétien's "eternal salvation" was at risk. Economic policy Chrétien cancelled the privatization of Toronto's Pearson airport. The consortium that was due to take ownership of Pearson sued for breach of contract, which led the government to settle out of court in April 1997 for $60 million in damages. The first budget introduced by Martin, in February 1994, was described as a "mild and tame" budget focused only on the target of reducing the deficit to 3 percent of Gross National Product (GNP) within three years, and brought in modest cuts, mostly to defence spending. Until the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the Chrétien government tended to be hostile towards defence spending with the government's white paper "Defence 94" declaring that in a post-Cold War world there would be less and less need for armed forces, which accordingly meant reduced budgets for the military. Outside of defence spending, there were few cuts in the 1994 budget. In a radio interview with Ron Collister in March 1994, Chrétien stated: "To go to our goal of 3 per cent of GNP, all the cuts have been announced in the budget. There will not be a new round." According to the diplomat James Bartleman, Chrétien told him in early 1994 that major cuts to government spending outside of defence were out of the question, and instead he hoped that the economy would grow enough on its own that the deficit would disappear without any cuts. Chrétien's plans in early 1994 for economic growth were to increase exports by embracing globalization and free trade with as many nations as possible, arguing that the export offensive would stimulate the economy out of the early 1990s recession. The 1994 budget was widely criticized by journalists such as Andrew Coyne as useless in even achieving its target of reducing the deficit to 3 percent of GNP within three years, let alone eliminating the deficit, and led to a celebrated clash between Coyne and Martin in the boardroom of The Globe and Mail newspaper. In April 1994, interest rates in Canada started a steady rise that would continue until early 1995. Chrétien was not keen on making deep cuts to government spending, but given the crisis caused by the skyrocketing interest rates had decided "reluctantly" there was no alternative. Once he had decided upon making deeper