Mr. Speaker, the auditor general has to look into it because the minister will not table the annual reports.
The Technology Partnerships Canada advisory board was formed in September 1996 and had 14 members. Now it appears as though six of the board members are with companies that have received grants from TPC. In fact, the companies associated with these six board members have received just shy of half a billion dollars in TPC funds. That is nearly half of the $947 million that was doled out under this program.
Could the industry minister tell us exactly what guidelines were in place to make sure that there was no conflict of interest on the advisory board?