It's unfortunate, Mr. Chair, that my colleague has undertaken to bring this forward now, simply because we do have important witnesses we should be hearing from. I do apologize on behalf of this side of the table for dismissing our previous witnesses much earlier. Obviously, they have important subject material that didn't get covered because of the choice of Mr. Andrews not to wait until committee business later on in the meeting.
Having said that, this is before committee now, and we'll have to undertake to review this.
You do know, Mr. Chair, that the Ethics Commissioner is currently reviewing the circumstances and the submission that has been brought forward. We also know that the Senate ethics commissioner is reviewing this. We also know that the Prime Minister has answered questions with regard to this and said that he knew nothing of it. Mr. Wright has also been clear—counter to what Mr. Andrews said—that he acted alone and he takes full responsibility for that. I would challenge Mr. Andrews to actually read some of the documentation that has circulated. If he even read local media or the media that's available, he'd know that.
We know that there is clarity that needs to be brought forward. We would look to the Liberals...it's an interesting and very partisan motion that he's brought forward. Obviously, it doesn't include Liberal Senator Mac Harb. We also think these allegations that are being brought forward are very similar to a case that we had in the House of Commons, which involved a former Liberal Attorney General, Wayne Easter. It involved a former Minister of the Crown, Judy Sgro, and it also involved a former Liberal member of Parliament, John Cannis.
We're wondering if Mr. Andrews might have an opportunity to share with us as to whether or not the fraudulent claims, of over $170,000, of these three individuals has been paid back to the Canadian taxpayer? We'd like to know that. We also want to know if that has all been cleared up, how it was cleared up, and how it differs from this case.
Mr. Chair, I would ask that we move in camera because I think the witness list has to be reviewed, and I think this is something that can be done by the committee as we move into committee business, if that's in fact what we're going to do. So I move that we move to committee business in camera.