Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in favour of the motion for the production of papers, sponsored by the member for Prince George—Bulkley Valley.
As has been mentioned previously, the Motion No. P-31 reads as follows:
That a humble Address be presented to His Excellency praying that he will cause to be laid before this House a copy of the Prime Minister's ethics code for ministers.
I would be remiss in commenting on the motion without quoting from a great work of fiction called Creating Opportunity: The Liberal Plan For Canada . The Liberal's red book in the 1993 election stated:
A Liberal government will appoint an ethics counsellor to advise both public officials and lobbyists in the day-to-day application of the code of conduct for public officials. The ethics counsellor will be appointed after consultation with the leaders of all parties in the House of Commons and will report directly to Parliament.
The Liberal government in fact appointed an ethics counsellor back in June 1994. Howard Wilson was assigned to take the job but his office was not independent. It was not developed in consultation with the other political parties. It was not legislated as accountable to parliament.
While the ethics counsellor reports to parliament on matters related to lobbying, he reports to one and only one person on matters related to ethics, the Prime Minister of Canada. The Prime Minister makes the decisions about the enforcement of ethics.
The question then arises, if the Prime Minister is the final judge of the ethics of his cabinet ministers, who judges the Prime Minister's ethics? That is why we need to have full transparency with respect to government ethics.
Motion No. P-31 is extremely timely in light of the efforts put forward by my caucus colleague from Markham to get answers from the Prime Minister in the Yvon Duhaime affair. I would like to review the troubling revelations that have recently come to light.
In April 1993 Les Entreprises Yvon Duhaime purchased the inventory, furnishings and ongoing business of the Auberge Grand-Mère located in the Prime Minister's riding of Saint-Maurice from 161341 Canada Inc. At the time the opposition leader of the day, now the Prime Minister, held a 25% stake in the numbered company.
In September 1997 Duhaime's company received a $615,000 loan from the Business Development Bank of Canada Tourism Investment Fund. At the same time he also received a $50,000 loan from the Canada Economic Development Fund for the Quebec regions. These loans were to be applied to a 24 room addition to the hotel. The expansion plans were expected to total $1.2 million. Duhaime said he discussed the proposed expansion with Chrétien's special riding representative and was told where to apply—