Mr. Speaker, I discussed the incident with the minister who, like all members of this House, is the member of Parliament for his riding. All members must be available to their constituents and try to provide the services expected of a member.
In this particular case, all the minister did was bring this application to the attention of the chairman of the CRTC, with the comment: "This application should receive due consideration. To me, this means: Could you take care of this dossier, and if there are any problems, if I can be of any assistance as the member for Laval, fine.
Subsequently, when his letter was interpreted as a letter of support, as soon as the minister heard about this, without any pressure from anyone, he immediately wrote to this person, and a copy was sent to the commission to make it clear he had not supported the application in any way. He had simply asked the commission to do its job.
This is always a problem for ministers. The Hon. Leader of the Opposition must have had that experience himself. A minister is also a member of Parliament, and we have a duty to represent our constituents without influencing bodies like the CRTC.