Mr. Chair, actually I appreciate Mrs. Redman's observation. You yourself had noticed that I was getting a little too detailed in my analogy and that perhaps the point had been made without the need for me to continue on through multiple examples.
But the point I was driving at is that there are different legitimate interpretations of the law. You'll notice I'm using the word “legitimate” now. Of course this goes back to my concern about the word “illegitimate”. There are legitimate different interpretations of the law, so you know, it makes it inappropriate to use the term “illegitimate”.
I'm bringing all this back to the point I was getting at, which is that there are four reasons why the Liberals are objecting to the examination of both their expenses and ours in both 2004 and 2006. I was on the fourth of those points, which is that there is a process for dealing with these things, and they want to have a discussion that essentially prejudges before the courts have a chance to judge.
Now, in the end, whatever it might happen to be, no matter whether it's in context or out of context, the judgment of this committee is going to be a preliminary finding. Ultimately the courts will rule as to whether the Conservative Party is deserving of those rebates that it is seeking before the courts or whether in fact the Conservative Party's interpretation was not the correct one. And when that happens, everything we've done here will all kind of fade away.
But, Mr. Chairman, I think the concern the Liberals have is that there could be an election in between then and now and they really could use a Conservative scandal, and this one just looks so juicy. The facts may not be on their side, but we can set up a set of hearings in which only some of the facts get presented, in which people will be asked questions.... And Mr. LeBlanc sort of hinted at this in his comments--or he didn't hint, he said specifically--that they will be asked, were you pushed, were people prodding you, were they bullying you? Whatever, these questions are all subjective. They're not questions of law. They're not questions that ask, did somebody illegally force you to do something? Did they tell you to doctor your books, for example? Those would be breaches of the law. No, it's all this sort of soft stuff. But it will make great TV, and with any luck, if we have an election between the time at which we have these hearings and the time at which the courts decide, bang, we're set, we have what has the appearance of being a scandal. If a bit later on the courts rule and it turns out it wasn't a scandal, well, who cares? We did better in the polls because we left the false impression that somebody was engaged in activities that were wrong, because we decontextualized the whole thing.
That's the point, Mr. Chairman. That's the fourth point, and frankly, that's the most important one. They're hoping to engage in a court of star chamber. They're hoping to engage in a McCarthyite witch hunt. It is inappropriate, Mr. Chairman, and that's why we're seeking to amend this to make it more open and to ensure that a context is provided by looking at Liberal financing practices for 2004 and Conservative financing practices in 2004. The Liberals aren't interested, because they think that Tom Flanagan has indicated that this particular financing method wasn't in use in 2004. But we're seeking to open this up, and if they go along with that, Bob's their uncle, we've got our hearings. But I think the hearings won't produce the make-believe scandal they think they can generate, and that's what I'm hoping to see changed.
For that reason, Mr. Chairman, I will be supporting the proposed amendment to the original motion.
Thank you.