House of Commons Hansard #250 of the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was chair.

Topics

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

May 9th, 2013 / 2:15 p.m.

Outremont Québec

NDP

Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister may have been confused by this question yesterday, so let us try this again.

If he has nothing to hide, will he support the NDP motion calling for the release of all documents related to the missing $3.1 billion?

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:15 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Conservative

Stephen Harper ConservativePrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, of course, that is not what the Auditor General said at all and that is obviously why we reject the motion. In fact, the Auditor General has made certain suggestions to the government, recommendations on how to improve reporting on this matter. The government will follow, and is following, those recommendations.

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:15 p.m.

Outremont Québec

NDP

Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, at first, they tried to explain how they lost track of $3.1 billion. They said that it was an internal matter. Then, they said it was a categorization error. The Conservatives definitely want to keep this internal categorization error a secret. If the Prime Minister has nothing to hide, then he should come clean.

How can Canadians trust the Conservatives and their government when they have not lifted a finger to try to find the missing $3.1 billion?

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Conservative

Stephen Harper ConservativePrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, once again, the Auditor General himself has rejected the NDP leader's allegation. The Auditor General has made recommendations on how to improve reporting in the future. Clearly, the government will follow those recommendations.

EthicsOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Outremont Québec

NDP

Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, Mike Duffy, Mac Harb and Patrick Brazeau are all very good friends of the Liberals and the Conservatives, and they were caught red-handed making dubious claims for hundreds of thousands of dollars of taxpayers' money.

Once they were caught, their only punishment was to pay back the money. They did not receive any punishment for betraying Canadians' trust or anything that would deter them from doing it again.

If you want to commit fraud, all you have to do is get appointed as a Liberal or Conservative senator and you will not be punished. Is that the message the government is trying to send?

EthicsOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Conservative

Stephen Harper ConservativePrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, external auditors and experts examined all these expenditures and said that the rules were not clear. However, the Senate decided that it expects better judgment from certain senators and that all of the money in question will be repaid to the government.

EthicsOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Outremont Québec

NDP

Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, here is what is clear. Even the bogus investigation by his hand-picked cronies in the Senate found that Mike Duffy does not maintain a primary residence in Prince Edward Island. That means Mr. Duffy has not been a resident of Prince Edward Island in nearly 40 years, even though he was chosen for the Senate four years ago. The Constitution requires that a senator “be resident in the Province for which he is appointed”. The Conservatives now admit, through their own bogus investigation, that Mr. Duffy is not a resident of P.E.I., yet still say that he is qualified to be a senator from P.E.I.

Why is the Prime Minister allowing this continuous fraud by the Conservatives in the Senate?

EthicsOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Conservative

Stephen Harper ConservativePrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, an independent external auditor was brought in to examine all of these expenses. He looked obviously at the expenses of three particular senators who have had some difficulty. The auditor has concluded that the rules in place were not clear, however, the Senate itself has decided it expects better judgment from the senators. Senator Duffy some months ago repaid the money and the Senate has decided that other senators will be expected to similarly repay those amounts.

Employment InsuranceOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Outremont Québec

NDP

Thomas Mulcair NDPLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, on another very serious matter, Jane Kittmer was diagnosed with breast cancer while receiving EI maternity leave benefits after the birth of her second child. Jane has beaten cancer, but for two and a half years she has had to fight the government for the EI sick leave benefit that she has paid into. Six weeks ago, the Prime Minister said this in the House, “the government is looking at a way to resolve this case”. Nothing has been done so far. Can the Prime Minister please tell Jane why not?

Employment InsuranceOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Calgary Southwest Alberta

Conservative

Stephen Harper ConservativePrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, let me just remind members of the facts here, which is that the government has recently changed the law to deal with such cases in the future. This particular case is occurring under rules that existed under the previous government. However, as I said before in the House and I reiterate today, the government is committed to addressing and resolving that matter, and we continue to work on that.

EmploymentOral Questions

2:20 p.m.

Liberal

Dominic LeBlanc Liberal Beauséjour, NB

Mr. Speaker, while families are trying desperately to help their children find a summer job, the Conservatives' priorities are elsewhere.

Instead of helping youths and middle-class families, the Conservatives are wasting more than $3,000 of taxpayers' money a day to spy on their own members in the media.

The question I would like to ask the Prime Minister is this: how many people asked him to waste the equivalent of a job a day to spy on his own Conservative MPs in the media?

EmploymentOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Haldimand—Norfolk Ontario

Conservative

Diane Finley ConservativeMinister of Human Resources and Skills Development

Mr. Speaker, to go back to the premise of the question, in fact, we just today announced the launch of Canada summer jobs 2013. It is a program that will create 36,000 jobs for young Canadians right across this great country. Not only will they get the experience that is so necessary for jobs in the future, but they will also get financial assistance to help pay for those careers so that they can develop the skills that are needed for the jobs of today and tomorrow.

EmploymentOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Liberal

Ralph Goodale Liberal Wascana, SK

Mr. Speaker, the U.S., Japan, Australia, Sweden and other countries are all expecting economic growth better than Canada. Young Canadians especially are falling behind. There are 212,000 fewer of them who are working today than before the recession, 404,000 are looking for jobs, and this paranoid isolated government wastes $23 million, $32,000 every day, to spy on the media and its own backbench. For that spy money, the government could have triggered 7,600 summer jobs. Why did it not do that?

EmploymentOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Haldimand—Norfolk Ontario

Conservative

Diane Finley ConservativeMinister of Human Resources and Skills Development

Mr. Speaker, apart from the Canada summer jobs program that we launched today creating 36,000 jobs for young Canadians, this year alone we are helping 60,000 young people get jobs. Beyond that, since 2006, our government has helped over two million young people get jobs and get the skills and training for those jobs so they can contribute, participate and benefit from the workplace.

Statistics CanadaOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Liberal

Ralph Goodale Liberal Wascana, SK

Mr. Speaker, the government is wasting $32,000 tax dollars every day to spy on the media and its own backbench. It wastes another $95,000 tax dollars on every government ad during hockey games. It vandalized the census and it now costs $25 million more to get less data. In 43% of Saskatchewan, it is a total failure. They have lost the town of Davin altogether and so Davin loses its municipal funding. Will the government compensate Davin for this Conservative ideological stupidity?

Statistics CanadaOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Mégantic—L'Érable Québec

Conservative

Christian Paradis ConservativeMinister of Industry and Minister of State (Agriculture)

Mr. Speaker, first of all, our government is committed to collecting statistical data while protecting Canadians' privacy. This is the principle.

That being said, the survey provides useful and usable data for communities, representing 97% of the Canadian population. More Canadians responded to this survey than ever before. Statistics Canada just said yesterday, “At the national, provincial level, all of this information is pretty solid. It's high quality.”

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

NDP

Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe NDP Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives still cannot tell us what the missing $3.1 billion was used for. Where is that money? Is it under a rock, between the cushions of a couch or in the toilet of an embarrassed mayor's cousin?

The Auditor General's report is clear: the Treasury Board stopped tracking expenditures made under the anti-terrorism initiative in 2010. Yesterday, I asked the President of the Treasury Board what has been happening since 2010. He was unable to answer me.

He lost $3.1 billion because he failed to track spending. How much more will he lose if he is still not tracking expenditures?

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Parry Sound—Muskoka Ontario

Conservative

Tony Clement ConservativePresident of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario

Mr. Speaker, as I have already said, all of the information for every year from 2001 to 2012 can be found in the public accounts.

The Auditor General clearly stated:

We didn't find anything that gave us cause for concern that the money was used in any way it should not have been.

He went on to say that departments:

...are responsible for accounting and reporting their spending through the Public Accounts of Canada....

He said that departments would have undergone normal control procedures in those departments. So there are internal controls in departments about spending, and they would go through all of those normal processes.

Those are the words of the Auditor General.

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

NDP

Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe NDP Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC

Give me a break, Mr. Speaker. Do we need to send the UPAC to search the President of the Treasury Board's office to get answers?

He still thinks that quoting the Auditor General out of context is going to convince people. Come on. The President of the Treasury Board lost track of $3.1 billion. It is therefore up to him to answer to Canadians, in his own words.

His department maintains that a new expenditure monitoring system will not be implemented until 2014. That means four full years without proper monitoring.

Can the President of the Treasury Board tell us how much money has been spent on the anti-terrorism initiative since 2010?

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Parry Sound—Muskoka Ontario

Conservative

Tony Clement ConservativePresident of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member asks whether I should be quoting the Auditor General. Who else should I be quoting?

He goes on to say:

We didn't identify anything that would cause us to say that we felt that anything was going on outside of these processes.

He is very clear that the opposition characterization of these funds as lost in any way is completely inappropriate. He indicated that there was nothing:

...that gave us cause for concern that the money...was used in any way that it should not have been.

Those are the words of the Auditor General.

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

NDP

Malcolm Allen NDP Welland, ON

Mr. Speaker, the President of the Treasury Board continues to simply choose the quotes he likes from the Auditor General. He keeps saying that public accounts has the money.

Here is what the Auditor General actually said:

The information reported annually in the public accounts was at an aggregate level and...not separately reported as a distinct (or separate) line item. Furthermore...much of that information is now archived and unavailable.

Why is the President of the Treasury Board claiming the money is in the public accounts when the Auditor General says no, it is not.

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Parry Sound—Muskoka Ontario

Conservative

Tony Clement ConservativePresident of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario

Mr. Speaker, I will remind the hon. member that the public accounts are tabled in this chamber each and every year from 2001 to 2009, or if he wishes, 2001 to 2012. These are a matter of public record.

Parliamentarians vote on the public accounts. This is part of our responsibility as parliamentarians. Those are clear. In fact, the Auditor General says that each department is responsible for its own spending and “normal control procedures in those departments”.

Again, the Auditor General said:

...so there are internal controls in departments about spending and they would go through all of those normal processes.

I rely on him.

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

NDP

Malcolm Allen NDP Welland, ON

Mr. Speaker, clearly the department of the President of the Treasury Board did not do those controls, or it would know where the $3.1 billion went in the first place.

The government has abandoned accountability. The Auditor General said this money was not reported to Parliament, and contrary to what the President of the Treasury Board says, it was not even reported to cabinet, the Auditor General said.

Earlier today, the Conservative member for Nipissing—Timiskaming said the billions of dollars would be identified in “due course”.

Can the President of the Treasury Board tell us when “due course” will eventually find its way to this House?

Government ExpendituresOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Parry Sound—Muskoka Ontario

Conservative

Tony Clement ConservativePresident of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario

Mr. Speaker, I hate to disagree with the hon. member. I certainly do not want to be disagreeable.

However, again I will quote the Auditor General:

...[departments] are responsible for accounting and reporting their spending through the Public Accounts of Canada....

That is a direct quote from the Auditor General. He said that spending within the departments would have undergone normal control procedures in those departments. He concludes:

We didn't identify anything that would cause us to say that we felt that anything was going on outside of those processes.

These are the words of the Auditor General.

Public Works and Government ServicesOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

NDP

Linda Duncan NDP Edmonton Strathcona, AB

Mr. Speaker, here is a reason the government needs to find that $3.1 billion.

This week the Ontario Superior Court ordered a further increase in the award of damages the government must pay Envoy Relocation Services, now over $40 million in total.

In addition, it ordered the government to pay the full costs of $4.7 million because, in the words of the court:

reprehensible...conduct of the...[Crown] supplemented and aggravated by...conduct during the litigation.

How can the government defend this reprehensible behaviour, leaving taxpayers to foot the bill?