Public Accounts Committee on Nov. 27th, 2024

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I think I have to rewind to W.C. Fields just so everyone's clear on the train of thought.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I think you should start from the top.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Start from the top? Okay. I appreciate the suggestion from the Liberals.

Here we are debating a closure motion that the Liberals have put forward.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Oh, he actually started from the top.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

That closure motion is to shut down this committee hearing on delving into the $400-million green slush fund. It is technically called SDTC, Sustainable Development Technology Canada.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Mr. Perkins, I will call it. You're being repetitive now. Pick it up where you had it. Do not start from the top, please.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I was just taking requests from other members. The Liberals wanted to hear it again.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

We have more requests if you'll take them, Mr. Perkins.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I'll bet you do.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Order, please.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I appreciate the humour. Thank you.

There were 29,000 pages finally provided in tranches. That ended about a week ago. About a week ago, the government House leader proudly went and held a press conference—because, you know, this was a big deal—and said they had complied. They had complied by providing 29,000 pages with blacked-out paper; 29,000 pages.

Of course, that's not complying. I know that sometimes it can be challenging for government members to actually read the motion that was passed in the House. I've read that motion a bunch of times. Nowhere in it does it say, “Please edit and pick out what you don't want us to see and what helps protect your Liberal appointees. Don't supply that.” It didn't say, as the Prime Minister's department ordered departments to do, “Please exempt the documents based on the Privacy Act.” It didn't say, “Please exempt the documents on the Access to Information Act.” That's exactly what the Prime Minister's Office ordered PCO to tell departments. As a result, since September 26 we've been having a discussion in the House about the cover-up on this. That cover-up could be stopped.

The Liberals complain that, “Gee, we now all of a sudden care about money being spent on debate in the House.” Well, last time I checked, the House was debating Liberal corruption on the green slush fund and their filibuster preventing those documents from coming or not. I believe, on the Standing Orders, the House would have been sitting anyway, debating more useless government legislation putting Canadians into bankruptcy and more attempted bribes of providing temporary tax-free restaurant meals. That will give great, great comfort to the two million Canadians every month who use the food bank. I'm sure they'll appreciate, when they go to the restaurant, not having to pay the GST for Christmas. Oh, wait. They're going to a food bank. I don't think that's probably in the cards for them.

We would have been debating those incredibly cynical and silly pieces of legislation that this government continues to think will save them from the depths of 19% in the polls.

What has happened is that this all could have been solved. We probably wouldn't even be here having these discussions if the government had just listened to democracy and actually produced the documents.

There was a Liberal prime minister that I think these folks seemed to admire. I don't admire him as much as the Liberals do, but Prime Minister Chrétien at least thought financial responsibility and balanced budgets were of some value, unlike the red-ink Liberals. He had numerous scandals too. You wouldn't be a Liberal government if you didn't have pretty significant Liberal scandals. There was one called the sponsorship scandal. There was a demand for all these documents too. Do you know what he did? Does anyone know what Prime Minister Chrétien, a Liberal, did? He turned them over to the police.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

No.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Yes. When he was asked, he turned them over to the police.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

That's obstruction.

[An hon. member]

[Inaudible—Editor]

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Order.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

He turned them over. Do you know what? He didn't redact them. He didn't redact them. He didn't redact them. He said, sure, if something and somebody did something wrong, they should pay for it.

Apparently, this version of the Liberals, under the ethically challenged Prime Minister who himself has been convicted twice of ethic breaches—

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Just one second, Mr. Perkins. There's a point of order.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Again, I'll talk about relevance and about what is misleading in what Mr. Perkins is saying. He's just spinning the facts to how he likes them as opposed to what the facts actually are.

Come on, guys. Let's not do this.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

Mr. Perkins, you have the floor.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

I know how much the Liberals hate it when I find another Liberal who actually did the right thing.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

I have a point of order again, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Ms. Khalid.