Mr. Speaker, when the Prime Minister appointed the Minister of Canadian Heritage to her office in 1996, at that time Joe Thornley and his firm had not received one single solitary Canadian heritage contract.
Joe Thornley was and is the heritage minister's campaign manager. Since 1996 Thornley has received over three-quarters of a million dollars in contracts from her department.
Is it not clearly obvious why the Prime Minister needs an independent ethics commissioner to answer to Parliament?