Thank you, Mr Chair.
I'd like to welcome Mr. Bachrach, who has now joined us.
I was going to say that I am grateful to Mr. Masse for introducing the amendment. Mr. Masse is often a voice of reason on the committee. I certainly think his amendment seeks to improve the original motion. It is therefore hard to oppose it.
That said, the argument behind the motion is that the $50 million in subsidies given to Mastercard must be hiding something. What Mr. Perkins is implying is that he's trying to hone his arguments to explain why $50 million was given to Visa and Mastercard. He probably thinks that since the credit card companies had to incur costs to enter into the agreement, the government gave them a subsidy in exchange. I don't know whether this is true or not, since I wasn't there when the decision was made. According to him, it follows that we have to look into it because the government is corrupt.
It's no secret that I'm not a big fan of the Liberal government. However, the announcement of this investment of approximately $500 million, including a $49‑million subsidy, was made during the previous Parliament, in January 2020, when I was not yet an MP. Investing half a billion dollars is not the kind of thing that can be decided in a few seconds between Christmas and New Year's. That means that it was in the works in 2019, 2018, 2017 or earlier. Furthermore, after the investment was made and the subsidy was granted, it was announced that an agreement with Visa and Mastercard had been reached in 2023.
If someone can convince me that the $50‑million subsidy was used to reimburse Mastercard for the agreement, I am open to being swayed. However, according to the calendar, it's impossible. The agreement was reached by the current government in 2023, years after the project was set up in 2018, 2019 or 2020. It was not reached prepandemic.
I will therefore vote in favour of the amendment. I think it's appropriate, since it takes this idea of a people's court out of the motion. However, when it comes to the story I'm being told to encourage me to vote in favour of the motion, you'll have to do better than saying that the earth is flat and gravity no longer exists. If someone convinces me that the story is possible and plausible and does not defy the laws of physics, I may consider it. However, for the time being, I cannot believe, in my heart of hearts, that the story is remotely true.