Mr. Speaker, the government tabled the public accounts last week and as usual it was another list of wild and wacky waste.
Here is just a taste of the waste: $93,000 in compensation for mistakenly identified potato seeds, and it is hard to mistake a potato, and $14,000 in compensation to a hog farmer who made modifications to his barn based on a bureaucrat's opinion, and that was a barnburner of a bureaucratic opinion.
We also paid $9,000 to a prisoner because a correctional officer used unreasonable force to stop him from swallowing contraband, $4,500 to two prisoners who had their pictures taken accidentally, and we thought their mug shots were free, and $2,500 to an inmate because he did not like being bunked with a smoker, the poor dear.
The government has its priorities wrong: waste and mismanagement before defence and security. It is time to return the government's books to sender because they just do not add up.