Mr. Speaker, Senator Manning was always in favour of Senate reform and he still would be if he were alive today.
This past Friday the Prime Minister appointed a new senator from B.C. to fill a recent vacancy; another patronage appointment, his friend Ross Fitzpatrick. It just so happens that the Prime Minister was a director on the board of Fitzpatrick's company, Viceroy Resource Corporation, and the Prime Minister was offered up to 50,000 stock options.
Did the Prime Minister consult with the ethics counsellor before appointing a man who had offered him stock options worth potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars?