Evidence of meeting #123 for Industry, Science and Technology in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was aluminum.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
No. I did what any respectable manager would do. The first thing I did, when I was made aware of issues with SDTC, was suspend the funding. We also demanded the resignation of the board and the chair. We called for an investigation to make sure....
I was the director of ethics in my previous job before Parliament, sir. I know exactly what to do in those circumstances. We applied the best practice and—
Conservative
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
—now we're co-operating with the Auditor General, as we should.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
You're here with regard to the estimates.
You suspended the funding, yet the estimates that were tabled in Parliament for this fiscal year allocate another $191 million to the green slush fund, which you have suspended because of suspicions about the corruption of the directors.
Why, as minister, did you go and try to get another $191 million for this corrupt organization?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
I don't know which organization you're referring to.
Conservative
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
Which one of the two are you referring to?
Conservative
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
I don't understand your question then, sir.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
It's a simple question.
Why did you give another—
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
Tell me which entity you're referring to.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
I did. It's SDTC. Why did you ask for another $191 million?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
We need to make sure that while this company....
By the way, I am surprised by the nature of the question, because this is an entity. I hope you're going to have witnesses say what they did. There were 500 companies....
I'm sure there are some in Nova Scotia who would like to hear from you.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
With all due respect, I asked some simple questions—
Liberal
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
—and you've refused to answer any of them.
I'm going to move on.
How much carbon has the net zero accelerator fund reduced with the $8 billion you've spent?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
How much do we produce? We don't produce carbon.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
How much carbon has the net zero accelerator reduced as per its goal in the $8 billion you've spent?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
First of all, if you want to talk about the net zero accelerator fund, it's a great thing. It has allowed us to decarbonize a number of industries in the country. We talked about aluminum. We talked about steel.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
How much carbon has it reduced?
The Auditor General said in the report that was out last week that you don't track a single dollar or a single carbon emission. Are you telling me the department tracks it in a way the Auditor General can't find?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
He's not the Auditor General, by the way.
Conservative
Rick Perkins Conservative South Shore—St. Margarets, NS
He works as part of the Auditor General's office. Perhaps I should explain that to you.
Liberal