Mr. Speaker, I rise today to debate Bill C-11, the Liberal government's half attempt at protecting public servants who blow the whistle on corruption in government. It is a necessary bill but one, I am sad to say, the Liberal government never took very seriously.
I wish to begin by congratulating the member for Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry for his ongoing determination to see a whistleblower protection act that actually protects those who disclose wrongdoing. The voters in that riding would do well to remember it was that member, not the Liberal government, who pushed Bill C-11 from a woefully inadequate, fatally flawed bill to at least a workable framework for protecting whistleblowers. I believe that member of Parliament will be in the House to see a Conservative government that will finish the job.
With the prospect of a Conservative government to replace this tired and scandal plagued Liberal regime on the horizon, it gives me the opportunity to think aloud about what it will take to root out the Liberal culture of corruption and bring about a better, cleaner government for Canadians. This is no small step. Forming government means that we will take the reins as the largest employer in the land. A Conservative government would have to strive for labour excellence with the public service, not settle for the old Liberal pattern to disregard and demoralize.
Labour excellence is about forging a new relationship with our public servants, recognizing them as valued partners in the quest for open, transparent and fully accountable government that is finally free from the stain of corruption. Labour excellence between a Conservative government and the public service will have to include many things.
Some context for this bill: settling contracts on time or better, not allowing them to languish for months as this Treasury Board president did; bargaining fairly and not counting on public stereotypes of bureaucrats to strengthen the government hand to legislate back to work and impose a settlement, as this Treasury Board president hoped to do last year.
Such a partnership will require real whistleblower protection, not the amended bill we have before us today.
During debate on Bill C-11, I have seen a change in the Liberal tone. There is a jump in their step. They are talking about the wonders of a minority government while they secretly hope the public does not remember the two previous incarnations of this bill that did nothing to protect whistleblowers and everything to protect Liberal corruption.
The Liberal government introduced its fatally flawed bill in March 2004, just after the Auditor General slammed the Liberal sponsorship program and the government for breaking every rule in the book. The Liberals introduced that bill just before pulling the plug on the public accounts committee and on Parliament to keep Liberal ad scam misdeeds from reaching the voters. In other words, the Liberal government never intended to protect those who blew the whistle on its corruption.
I remember Allan Cutler. Most of us remember him for bravely disclosing corruption, but how many other faceless and nameless public servants had their careers, their health and their reputations destroyed for trying to do the same before the Auditor General broke ground on the truth behind the Liberal sponsorship program? They must be devastated listening to Liberals yesterday and today acting like they are actively part of a real whistleblower protection act. In fact, Liberals have been selling the false idea that this is already legislation. What a slap in their faces.
Now I am not fooled. Not only did the Liberal government fake whistleblower protection before the last election, it had the audacity to bring back the flawed bill after the election. Another slap in the face to public servants who have high ethics.
Canadians are not fooled. If former Liberal cabinet minister David Dingwall were not under a cloud of suspicion for bilking Canadian taxpayers with padded expense claims and kickbacks for lobbying the Liberal cabinet for Technology Partnerships Canada grants, the government would not have made a single amendment to Bill C-11, not one.
The Liberal government is in desperate need of an extreme ethical makeover but that makeover does not start with a few half measure amendments that are only better than the original bill because the original bill was so awful. Such an ethical makeover starts with a heartfelt commitment that taxpayer dollars are the delegated trust of hardworking Canadians coast to coast to their representatives, not the personal playthings of a power-mongering Liberal Party desperate to hold power.
Such an ethical makeover requires seeing public servants as public guardians of ethics in the processes of government, not potential leaks that must be quashed to preserve Liberal corruption. These public guardians deserve our utmost consideration as full partners ensuring that the dollars taxpayers pay in good faith help fellow Canadians in need and are not syphoned off to reward the friends and cronies of an institutionalized Liberal government.
Such an ethical makeover is not possible for the Liberal government. The evidence of that is in this amended Bill C-11. Liberals had the chance to get it right and chose not to. The Liberal government had the chance to shed a light into the darkest corners of every government department, but since Canadians would likely have seen Liberal rats scurrying about, the government chose to adopt a cover-up clause instead.
First the Liberals wanted 20 years without disclosure. They would never take zero. They would go no lower than five years. For five years, disclosure of wrongdoings can sit inside a government department before coming to light. Not only this but the Liberals had the chance to broadly apply whistleblower protection without strings attached. They chose not to.
The cabinet will retain the unilateral power to pull protection from whistleblowers, for example, at crown corporations. Disgraced David Dingwall was just forced out of a crown corporation by the official opposition's digging to expose his outlandish abuse of taxpayer dollars, not because the government was forthcoming about it. If Liberals had their way, he would still be CEO of the mint, bilking taxpayers for lavish dinners and golf memberships in secrecy. The Liberals cannot undertake an extreme ethical makeover because they had the chance and did not.
I will reluctantly support the bill, quite frankly because it is the best we will get from the Liberal government. This is better than the naked exposure public servants of high integrity and ethics faced for 12 Liberal years for doing the right thing by disclosing corruption, abuse and waste.
It is too bad the Liberals could not muster the courage to end their self indulgence with a comprehensive whistleblower protection act that would once and for all slap constraints on their corruption addiction. Because the Liberals are incapable of cleaning up corruption and cannot handle disclosure of the truth about their corruption, Canadians will have to sweep them from power.
Only the Conservative Party can clean up Liberal corruption and restore better government to a great Canada. The Conservative Party is ready to step in and do the job of protecting all whistleblowers, not just most.
The member for Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry is ready. As the next Government of Canada, Conservatives will end the cover-up clause and apply whistleblower protection to all agencies of the government. That is the clean government Canadians deserve.