Shakedown, as the Liberal member says. It was a shakedown by a Liberal fundraiser in Quebec and he was convicted. I might hazard a guess that this is the tip of the iceberg of the kinds of things that go on behind the scenes here.
We see the facade of the government when it says it is doing this or that. However another level is operating of scandal and mismanagement with the Liberal government. I make these assertions of fact because in the end how can Canadians trust the government to manage their dollars when these kinds of things go on? How can Canadians trust the government to manage the budget of the country when a Liberal fundraiser is convicted of influence peddling in the province of Quebec. As the Liberal member said, shaking down individuals for donations to the Liberal Party of Canada before they would get their grant?
Might I remind people that a government grant is taxpayer dollars, the hard earned cash that Canadians remit to the government. That money is supposed to be used wisely for services that Canadians want. That is the attitude of government members. I am sure they are just as embarrassed by this as much as members of the opposition are.
However it does not stop there. Not only was this Liberal Party fundraiser convicted of influence peddling, but there were other debacles such as the HRDC billion dollar boondoggle scandal. We are all well aware that grants were handed out, taxpayer dollars, often when applications had not been filed. Paperwork was done wrong. Grants went to Liberal ridings in disproportionate amounts. Part of the defence in the whole argument was for ministers to draw opposition members into the web. They said we were writing letters on behalf of programs also. This is part of their strategy. They draw in others as a defence mechanism to justify the mismanagement of taxpayer dollars. That is just not right.
Of course that boondoggle scandal led to the Shawinigate case. More police investigations have taken place in the Prime Minister's riding than perhaps anywhere else in the country. It is unbelievable. The Prime Minister admitted he had contacted an individual at the Business Development Bank on behalf of a constituent. He said that he was doing his job.
I guess his friend, Alfonso Gagliano, the former minister of public works, was just doing his job too when he intervened and called the head of a crown corporation on behalf a friend. Well, he is no longer with us for who knows what reason. Perhaps it could be related to that incident.
The fact is this kind of scandalous mismanagement, this kind of corruption which goes on behind the scenes on the government side is an embarrassment to the country. It is an embarrassment to members on this side and I know it is an embarrassment to many of my colleagues on the Liberal benches, and it is wearing thin.
I am running out of time and I have five more pages of information having to do with how the government has missed opportunities over and over again and how it has betrayed the trust of Canadians in ways that are unspeakable. These occurrences are too common. These are taxpayer dollars given by people to the government for it to manage.
I also mention the parallel grant process. This story broke during the 2000 election. Grants that were given out in Quebec were put through a parallel process of approval through the Quebec Liberal Party. It was the Quebec branch of the federal Liberal Party of Canada. Who could imagine such a thing? It is unbelievable. It relates to the Pierre Corbeil incident, the convicted Liberal fundraiser from Quebec.
Those kinds of things go on behind the scenes. It is because of those kinds of actions that during this debate on the budget I propose the fundamental thesis that this governing group of Liberals cannot be trusted with taxpayers' dollars. It is time for them to be thrown out of office because of their scandalous record of mismanagement.