Through you, Madam Chair, how do you use the terms “robust” and “open”? We're in the public accounts committee dealing with an audit and we don't have basic information on the analysis by the government on how this came to be.
I'll give you an example. We're talking about Main Street versus Bay Street here. I have a whole community of businesses on Locke Street in my community whose 2019 revenues were dramatically reduced, and due to all these infrastructure programs they can't adequately show their losses and they didn't qualify for anything. One in five businesses in my city are not renewing their business licence. That is the reality and the of the small businesses that are trying to weather this storm.
I need to know whether the Department of Finance had, in its analysis, any thought around the way in which the major corporations of this country absolutely, in my opinion, bilked taxpayers on this program.
Once again, was a recommendation made that included an analysis in keeping with.... You don't have to tell me what the recommendation was, but did your department at least consider that corporations like Imperial Oil could take $120 million and pay out $300 million-plus dollars in dividends?