moved:
That an Order of the House do issue for copies of any letters since April 1, 2001, from the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and/or the Clerk of the Privy Council to Ministers and/or Deputy Ministers concerning answers to questions in the House of Commons.
Mr. Speaker, I think the listening public and some members are wondering why there is a “P” in the motion number. The “P” stands for the production of papers and documents.
I am not the only member of parliament who has had trouble getting information from the government. It has been systematic on the part of the Prime Minister to shut down the House if possible and deny members of parliament the tools to do their jobs.
It is often said that it is necessary only for the good man to do nothing for evil to triumph and there are signs all around us this week that parliament is being throttled by the Prime Minister's office.
Parliament has many functions and among those we are the auditors of the government. We have the right to probe and examine those who govern Canadians. That is what we do in opposition.
When the audit system breaks down, it fails the people and this place. I will draw a comparison to the private sector. Look at the example of Enron in the United States. When documents are not forthcoming or they are altered or shredded all for the sake of secrecy, the system simply breaks down.
With this motion, we are asking that the government to be required to produce information so members of parliament can do their jobs.
We operate under a set of rules often called the standing orders. Those are the tools we need to do our jobs. When those are systematically taken away by the government, it makes it very difficult for members of parliament to do their jobs, to hold the government accountable and to do what they were sent here to do.
There are so many examples. Where can I begin? Let me start with an issue I had before the House that involved a company by the name of Lancaster Aviation. The company was given the sole right to sell military equipment by the Government of Canada on a tendering process that, without exaggeration, was extremely flawed and was precisely written to ensure that company was given the opportunity to sell military equipment.
What got me on to this was the fact that the company in question was under contract with another company in Florida by the name of Airspares Inc. owned by a convicted felon in the United States. He was a fellow by the name of Mr. McFlicker. He had been convicted of international money laundering and taking part in the international prostitution business.
We have a company in Florida under contract with a Canadian company and, of all things, selling military equipment and spare parts.
I put questions to the minister in the House. In the 35 seconds that a minister has to respond, we will not get much of an answer, if we get one at all. That is why we often call it question period and not answer period. The government did not want to come clean on the file. It did everything within its power not to answer those important questions in regard to the contract with the indicted felon in the United States.
I had to put questions on the order paper because then the government was required to answer them. To be precise, the government must answer questions within 45 days.
I waited almost a full year for the government response to those questions. When it did respond, the fact is it did not answer the questions. Many of the documents I accessed through access to information had been blacked out before I received them.
This goes to the very motion before us today. At the moment we really do not know any more than what we and some national journalists dug up on this story. In other words, the information we should have received from the ministry was never received and what we did receive had been blacked out.
Following September 11 we learned that the pilots involved in the attack on the World Trade Center had been trained in Florida. In terms of the aviation industry, a lot of companies are centred in Florida. A lot of aviation parts and spare parts move through that state.
Knowing that this convicted felon in the United States who owned the warehouse had Canadian aviation parts in that warehouse, I wrote to the RCMP on September 18, exactly one week after the events in New York. I wanted to know whether or not the government had followed up on this individual in Florida. The RCMP wrote back stating:
--the RCMP, as is standard practice, does not confirm or deny, nor do we provide details regarding investigations. However, I can tell you that the RCMP has not been contacted to investigate a U.S. company, Airspares Network Incorporated, and its relationship with Lancaster Aviation.
In essence the government is saying there is nothing to worry about even though parts that are owned by the Government of Canada are stored in this warehouse in Florida, which is owned by a convicted felon, an international money launderer, convicted on drug smuggling and international prostitution charges. Without having done an investigation, the government has said there is nothing to worry about. That is how the issue arrived on the floor of the House of Commons. The government has systematically shut us down. It does that on a routine basis.
An article appeared in today's Globe and Mail and the headline indicates that the Deputy Prime Minister is to control $2 billion in Liberal reversal. The article states:
The federal Liberals are reversing a plan outlined in the December budget and are putting politicians in charge of handing out billions of dollars in megaproject funds.
Initially, the budget announced that an independent arm's length agency would handle the $2 billion strategic infrastructure foundation, but legislation to be introduced today will abandon that plan and put the money under the control of the Deputy Prime Minister.
The government has been successful in shutting down parliament and denying individual members of parliament information to do their jobs.
This change in government policy was introduced today and individual members on this side of the House can rest assured they will have great difficulty getting information on those infrastructure projects. It comes down to a $2 billion slush fund which conveniently has been put into the hands of the Deputy Prime Minister. I think we know why.
Last week in the House we all stood and applauded Preston Manning as he left parliament. What was the final message all members stood and applauded? It was in a headline in last week's paper: “Let morals guide you, Reform founder says”. I will read from that article:
Preston Manning, the founder of the Reform and Canadian Alliance parties, retired from politics yesterday with an appeal for parliamentarians to be guided by their personal, moral and spiritual beliefs when deciding controversial matters of public policy.
That is what we are asking for here. We are asking that parliament be allowed to work and that members of parliament be allowed to do the job they were sent here to do.
Members only have to look at the power the Prime Minister's Office has to thwart the role of parliament. It has been done so successfully over the years.
It is quite ironic that I am here tonight speaking to this issue simply because the government attempted to shut me down. The government inadvertently moved this item to the order paper, which meant it was going to be a votable motion. The government got tired of hearing from me on the floor of the House of Commons in relation to those questions that went unanswered for almost a year.
When members stand in the House during question period and they do not get answers, the standing orders allow them to put those questions in written form to the government. Out of frustration many members do not put those questions on the order paper. If we were to ask the House leader or his parliamentary secretary this evening how many questions are on the order paper, there would not be a lot of them. We are so used to not getting the answers that we simply have given up using the system. My problem would be a point in any case, in the sense that frustration wears members of parliament down.
Let us look at the Liberal benches. How many members from the opposition side have trotted across to the government side in the last couple of years? The answer is too many. There were at least three from the very party I am in, one from the NDP and one Canadian Alliance member. The reason is simple. It is like the Stockholm syndrome, where they wear down the enemy to the point where they are so frustrated they fall in love with their captors. That is the psychological phenomenon that happens.
This is like taking out the hostages. The Prime Minister trots them out and the only thing missing every time one of the members does that is the hood over the head.
In all seriousness, members of parliament get extremely frustrated when they are denied those answers. In question period particularly what does the Prime Minister do if the government does get in trouble with regard to a question? He attacks his attacker simply to shut the member down. If that does not work, Snow White, the role being played by the heritage minister, and the seven dwarfs get up for a standing ovation to shut down the opposition.
We have to continually press the government. We have to use the rules of the House effectively to get the information we need to hold the government accountable. Even then the government does not follow its own rules. It continually moves the goalposts.
Answers have to be given within 45 days but a member of parliament has to wait an entire year. I gave a speech in the House one night on a question of privilege regarding the delay in answering questions. When a member of parliament has to wait a year and we have to blow out the birthday candles on the set of questions, there is something wrong.
The Prime Minister, instead of being embarrassed about this is proud of it. He is proud of the fact that he can almost bring the House to a grinding halt. He is definitely the beneficiary of a split opposition. There is no question about that. There is an old expression that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. A case in point would be the Prime Minister.
There is no question that when the Prime Minister came to the House almost 40 years ago he was not the man he is today. He came here as a defender of the little guy. That was the reputation that brought him to this place and brought him the success he has enjoyed as Prime Minister and as a 40 year politician, but now that has eroded completely. That reputation is gone.
As the right hon. member who sits in front of me often says, the Prime Minister is no longer the man he used to be. That is so true. He is not the man he used to be. He forgot how he got here and he conveniently forgets why other members of parliament are here.
Good government comes with good opposition. That is all we are asking for in this place. We want the tools to do the job. We want the opportunity to do our jobs. We have to work much harder on this side as you well know, Mr. Speaker. You have been on this side as an opposition member. We have to work harder to do our jobs because we are often thwarted by government. That is not new and it is not unusual, but it is unbelievable the elaborate lengths to which the Prime Minister will go to shut this place down.
As a case in point, let us look at the Gagliano file. Mr. Gagliano is also part of the file in regard to Lancaster Aviation Inc. and the selling of surplus aviation parts. That had to go through his department, but do not ask the minister for information. The minister was much more articulate than he pretended to be. By the way, Mr. Gagliano conveniently has been smuggled off to Denmark to get him out of the country so he does not have to testify before the committee to find out what really went on in that department.
My colleague the member for Saskatoon--Humboldt, the critic for public works, condemned a Liberal dominated committee for voting against the motion to investigate allegations of patronage and political interference. The member for Saskatoon--Humboldt said that this was yet another example of the government's double standard on ethics and integrity in government.
More than just the people of Denmark are going to lose out on this one. Before he was appointed to the ambassadorship in Denmark, he wanted to go to the Vatican. Just imagine the Pope phoning the Prime Minister in total despair, thinking that his canonization may be in jeopardy if this guy is allowed to go to the Vatican. So he was shipped off to Denmark. We might say that Denmark is the loser in all of this but the truth is it is probably Mamma Teresa's spaghetti house where a table was roped off for the minister's dining group every night.
When the government is in trouble, it moves the person someplace, out of town and out of the country if necessary. It will sneak the person out of 24 Sussex Drive in the trunk of a car if it has to. That is what was done with the minister.
Members might also be interested to know the Standing Committee on Public Accounts met and recommended that an order of the House be issued for copies of all detailed expense account information for ministers and their exempt political staff. It recommended the information be tabled in the House and permanently referred to the public accounts committee. That was systematically shut down today by the government.
I look forward to the comments of my colleagues. I will sum up at the end of debate this evening.