Thank you, Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for your appearance today.
Largely, Mr. Rosenberg, you're going to be the beneficiary of my questions today.
On May 2 you appeared before the ethics committee, and you were asked by a Liberal member of that committee at that time whether or not there had been any interference by the government and the Prime Minister in connection with the donation we're talking about.
Your response was:
I am not aware of any communication with the Prime Minister, his office, or other bodies within the government regarding this matter.
Further on, that same Liberal member.... Actually, it wasn't a Liberal member. It was an NDP member. Mr. Green asked you this question: “Ms. Fournier stated that she remembers reviewing emails between the executive director, Elise Comtois, and the PMO. Were you aware of these emails?”
Your response was:
I don't recall, but I will say, just to go back, that if there were emails and there were documents that raised questions about this stuff, why didn't the foundation management call me to at least get my view on it so I could see the stuff...
I just want to ask you a few questions regarding those statements, because personally I find it incredible that you would say to the committee that you weren't aware of any sort of communication between the foundation and the Prime Minister's Office, the PMO, specifically when Pascale Fournier had indicated that there were numerous emails going on between the foundation and the PMO.
Now, in terms of the organization chart, Ms. Elise Comtois was the executive director, and she reported directly to you as president of the foundation. Is that correct?