Madam Speaker, thank you for allowing me to conclude my remarks on government operations. Again, to make sure that the people of Quebec and Canada who are listening understand clearly, I will repeat what Michel Vastel wrote in Le Droit yesterday. He was commenting on the findings of the Auditor General.
The Auditor General's comments, damning for George Radwanski, were carefully weighed so as to not smear the whole public service. But why does Sheila Fraser not go see, in the offices of ministers and deputy ministers for instance, if she could find more artificially inflated positions, patronage hiring, unjustified performance bonuses, excessive time off, falsified financial statements, high travel and entertainment expenses?
I would not want this Radwanski affair to be considered unique. There is a need for a thorough clean-up of this public service, which is vastly overclassified according to prominent analysts and those who have been following federal politics for years. A permanent solution is required.
Again, I hope that the Liberal members on the standing committee looking into the Radwanski affair will accept the recommendation made by my colleague from the Bloc Quebecois, the hon. member for Châteauguay, who is asking that Eddie Goldenberg be summoned to appear before the committee.
We really need to know who authorized the cost overruns and the unusually high travel expenses. Who made the decision? It would be important to know, if only to prevent this from ever happening again.
Of course, we must not stop there. It is especially important that the questions asked in the House by opposition members be answered. When we ask the government for an answer, it should avoid doing what it has been doing for the past two weeks: passing the buck. It is passing the buck. If it not the fault of the President of the Treasury Board. It is not the fault of the person in charge of the Queen's Privy Council, the hon. member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville—