I want to greet the chief whip who is coming into the House. I think he was quite right to get out his whip. His troops had deserted him, I believe. As he could not find them, he is here alone. But I can understand them.
I can understand their wanting to hide and to refrain from speaking on such a meaningless bill, a bill which does not in any way conform to their own platform or serve democracy in Canada and Quebec.
No doubt what annoys my Liberal colleagues the most is to see that there is nothing in this bill to reform of political party financing so as to achieve a greater transparency and improve democracy.
Speaking of political party financing, in the last election, all political parties promised to review this issue because it was determined that there is still too much hidden influence on the government's legislative agenda because of party financing. All parties agreed on that. The Liberal Party said so during the election but, typically, its members now say otherwise. That is just like the Liberal Party.
Just one party not only said that it would talk about party financing after the election but actually acted accordingly before the election by financing its activities in a manner different from what the other parties in this House did, refusing all contributions from people who do not have the right to vote, as has been the case in Quebec since 1977.
What can we say about the financing of political parties in this House? Well, there has been an improvement in the last 15 years. Previously, 80 per cent of corporations and big unions controlled political parties through party financing.
Thanks to the tax credit introduced about fifteen years ago, we have seen a constant increase in the public's involvement in party financing. In fact, we can now say that only 40 per cent of the major parties' revenues come from corporations. However, even with only 40 per cent, there is always a possibility of conflict of interest because any corporation donating $50,000 to a political party will probably engage in lobbying during the following parliamentary session.
Let us look only at the charges made against senators and members of the House of Commons in the last 10 years, particularly the behaviour of certain ministers in this House since the 1993 election. For example, less than two months after being elected, the Minister of Canadian Heritage invited 20 people to a $2,000
private cocktail, for a total of $40,000. A few months later, she awarded discretionary contracts out of the budget of the Canadian heritage department, using our tax money, to these people who had contributed $2,000 to her election campaign. Now this was a matter serious enough to ask for her immediate resignation. What did the Prime Minister do? He applauded the Minister, unlike the previous Prime Minister who, at least, had the decency to ask for their resignation in such cases.
Then, the former Minister of National Defence awarded a $75,000 phoney discretionary research contract to the treasurer of his riding's Liberal organization. Why did this minister award such a contract if not to recover some of that money for his own election? One has to wonder.
Let us talk about other ministers, including the Prime Minister, who travels all over Canada, and about receptions at $350 or $500 a plate-