Mr. Speaker, I have listened with a great deal of attention to the speeches we have just heard from our Liberal colleagues in connection with the motion we are debating today.
I find it shocking that they are trying to use fine words and dulcet tones to show just how purely they are administering this big beautiful country of Canada.
However, if they abandoned their fine words and got down to some fine actions, did things properly, perhaps we would have some credibility with the public, with Canadians and with Quebecers.
It is insulting to be told all that has been done to improve the system. What I am going to say is not, however, demagoguery, but truth. When it comes to a page of advertising that costs 25 or 30 times what it is worth, rather than saying: “Maybe we made a mistake”, maybe they should admit it, correct it and call for an investigation in order to show they are prepared to do more than drone on with fancy speeches.
They talk about the appointment of an ethics counsellor. This is one appointed by the Prime Minister, reporting to the Prime Minister and writing the PM's responses. Is it not high time to stop making Canadians laugh? If we want to take a bit of the tarnish off our image and regain a bit of credibility, would it not be high time for the hon. member to admit that this system is a fake?
To be credible, an ethics counsellor should be answerable to the House and not to the person who appointed him, hired him and asks him to investigate what he wants investigated.
This is why Canadians and Quebecers are starting to be fed up with the way they are being made fools of. Money is being wasted, because when a page of advertising costs 25 times what it should, there might be something else to do than to say “Maybe we made a mistake”. There should be an inquiry. This must stop happening. The money we administer here is not ours, it belongs to all Canadians.
I would ask the hon. member, who has given a very fine speech, if she would not be more in favour of a proper correction of this situation, for instance having the ethics counsellor become a true ethics counsellor, playing a proper role and not answerable solely to the person who hired him, but rather to the House. We are talking of a neutral ethics counsellor, one who would be unbiased in any blame that had to be laid. This is what Canadians want of their government. This is what we are reproached for, when it is said that we lack credibility with the public. We are not credible. I would like to hear the hon. member's reaction to this.