Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I appreciate the opportunity to share a few thoughts on this guillotine motion from the Liberal Party. That is exactly what this is. It's a guillotine motion, a term that's often used in Westminster for the shutting down of debate, the shutting down of the opportunity to study something. That is exactly what this guillotine motion does. It will prevent this committee.... I'm going to quote from the actual motion, “That no more meetings be conducted on Report 6, Sustainable Development Technology Canada.” We all know this fund as the green slush fund. That is exactly what this motion does. It's an attempt by the Liberal Party to once again prevent Canadians and this committee from getting to the bottom of the absolutely terrible conduct of the Sustainable Development Technology Canada board and its entities.
The fact that we still don't have answers from SDTC itself, from the ministers responsible, from the ministers implicated in this.... We will remember, as well, that not only is there a minister responsible for this program but that there's also a minister who's complicit and involved in this program in terms of financing and getting funding into the hands of a company in which he has a direct financial interest. However, that's exactly what this motion tries to do.
I don't think anyone is surprised that what's happening here is reflective of the Liberal actions in the House of Commons as well. What we're seeing there are constant attempts by the Liberal Party to try to sweep this issue under the rug to prevent Canadians from seeing how the depths of the corruption and the issues within this institution really are.
Four hundred million taxpayer dollars went into this entity. That's $400 million that I know each and every Canadian out there could have seen better dealt with than going to friends and acquaintances of these Liberal-appointed directors.
I don't think it's lost on anyone that when we did have former Liberal minister Bains at this committee twice on this matter, we still failed to get actual answers on how this was being undertaken. It's ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.
I would be remiss if I didn't point it out, as well.... I can only say so much because we can't talk about what happened in camera, but I can talk about the fact that this committee did go in camera earlier this week so that Canadians would be prevented from seeing the actual debate on a previous version of this. It's rather convenient for the Liberal Party that they wish—