Madam Speaker, Motion No. 2 states:
That, in the opinion of this House, the Parliament and Crown Agencies should be subject to scrutiny under the Access to Information Act.
This motion is brought before the House for debate by my colleague, the hon. member for Red Deer, who is also our foreign affairs critic.
What is access to information? Any Canadian should be able to write a letter asking for information from a federal government agency and get that information within 30 days. That is the Access to Information Act. We should be able to see the books or get minutes or papers relating to why a certain decision was made in the administration of the policy and programs of our federal government and crown agencies.
There should be nothing to hide about the Canadian Wheat Board, for example. Canadians know about the mess this Liberal government either created or at least allowed surrounding the Somalia inquiry. In that case documents were altered, severed, lost or destroyed. Canadians will never know what really happened because the Liberal government did not want us to know. It shut down the Somalia inquiry.
We use access to information to track the Liberal government's mismanagement of the expenditure of our tax dollars. The Somalia debacle is the prime example of the importance of the Access to Information Act. A CBC reporter using access to information received two copies of the same documents from national defence. The copies were different but they were supposed to be the same documents. The Somalia inquiry is a very sad chapter in Canadian history in terms of the Liberal Party's lack of respect for democracy.
Our access to information laws should be reviewed and strengthened. That is what this motion is asking. We should constantly be pursuing a freer and more democratic government and society. That is what the official opposition is trying to accomplish with this motion. We should not risk our national security, but we should try to be as transparent and open with the Canadian taxpayers as possible.
The Canadian taxpayer finances federal government endeavours. Where are the details? Why are the details concerning the expenses of the operation of the Canadian parliament not covered by ATI? That is a big question. Why are other important agencies protected? We need to know that. That is why we are debating Motion No. 2.
The Liberals could have taken action concerning this matter as soon as they saw that my colleague's Motion No. 2 was on the order paper. Rather, he had to wait for the lucky draw for his motion to be debated. The Liberals forced the debate to take place.
There is another way the Liberals could have proceeded. If the Liberals had looked through the lens of issues and not through the lens of political stripes, they would have read Motion No. 2 and done something about it. However we know they do not do that.
The official opposition is forcing the government to talk about accountability as it relates to crown agencies as well as parliament. There should not be a Liberal in the House who would oppose my colleague's motion. Every Liberal should want their constituents to have access to information concerning crown agencies and parliament. As our federal government contracts out more and more work, the records of these contracts become more and more important. We need access to information.
We have seen the Prime Minister strangle a taxpayer. We heard him talk about an imaginary friend. We have seen him apparently throw away the rights of Canadian university students in favour of a foreign dictator. Most recently we saw all parties in the House, including the Liberals, agree to televise all House of Commons committees. Yet the Prime Minister and the elite Liberals do not want it to happen. Maybe the report on televised committee sittings is in the same place where Motion No. 2 was before the member for Red Deer forced the Liberals to take it off the shelf and debate it in the House.
The democratic record of the government is abysmal. Members across the way should be ashamed of their record on democracy. They have moved closure or time allocation to limit debate in the House more than 52 times. The government does not like the democratic process.
When I was deputy critic for foreign affairs I tracked the shenanigans at the Canadian International Development Agency, CIDA. When my staff requested studies from CIDA, ATI requests came back saying “no such study was ever done”. Did CIDA change the name of the study? Or, was there really no such study? It is difficult to tell.
When our ATI laws are so weak it is difficult to know the facts and the truth. It makes it difficult to track the government, to hold the government accountable, to make the government more efficient, to find out where our money is being spent, where there is duplication and where there is waste. Canadians have the right to know what is happening with their money.
This is all wrong. It should be easy to track the government so we can be proud of our record and proud of the way the government is run. In conclusion, I urge members of the House to support Motion No. 2 and let us ensure that the Liberal government does not continue to make a mockery of democracy.