Mr. Speaker, because I have been critical of government funding of special interest lobbies and because I have called for more transparency and accountability from charities, I have become the target of repeated smear campaigns and attack ads by one of those lobbies, the Non-Smokers' Rights Association, and its front charity, the Smoking and Health Foundation.
Yet these organizations which are really one and the same have been receiving $500,000 yearly from Health Canada. This is unacceptable. Health Canada should not be bankrolling an organization that is trying to crush an MP who is merely doing the job he was elected to do. This has to stop.
Health Canada should be using taxpayers' dollars to finance health care and not lobbyists.