The hon. member will not listen. I am saying to him, and I will say it slowly and clearly so he can hear me, that $13 billion to $17 billion is spent in government departments in grants and contributions. I am only stating the facts. I do not think he would disagree with that. What we are asking is that if there is mismanagement in this billion dollars with HRD, is there a possibility that there could be some mismanagement in other departments with government funds? I would say, yes, there is a possibility of that.
The hon. member's second defence is the casting aspersions defence. He said it about nine different times. This is an attempt by the member to say that those who would ask questions might somehow be casting aspersions on individuals.
What we are doing is holding the government accountable and we are holding the minister accountable for her responsibility. Individuals within the different departments, the departmental officials which he noted, are between a rock and a hard place many times because they have to comply with those rules and regulations that are ever changing from directives of the minister.
After using his aspersions defence and his minimize defence, how can the member possibly defend this kind of spending of taxpayers' dollars as though it were nothing major and was just a minor thing happening—