House of Commons Hansard #149 of the 38th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was liberal.
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
A member called for a point of order. I would imagine he wanted to remind the member that she should not be using a prop. The member is not reading from it.
Françoise Boivin Liberal Gatineau, QC
Madam Speaker, I was actually reading from it, but that is okay.
Peter Adams Liberal Peterborough, ON
Madam Speaker, on a point of order, I protest. I certainly would not debate your decision, but in my view it was not a prop. The member was using it. She had to. She is functioning in both languages at once and on these occasions I think members do from time to time have to read material such as this.
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
Could the member for Gatineau please get to her question as the time is very brief.
Françoise Boivin Liberal Gatineau, QC
Madam Speaker, I simply stressed the fact that we are discussing a question of privilege concerning mailings. If we want to call the material that is central to this issue a prop, then I have some problems.
That said, I will go straight to the point. I would like to hear the comment of the honourable member concerning the following:
Yesterday, in an editorial interview with Le Soleil, the leader of the Bloc Québécois had some fairly harsh words about certain people who, like candidate Jean Ouimet, fuel the rumours about André Boisclair's past.
Various things are being said. Here is what the leader of the Bloc Québécois said:
On a sharply critical note, [the leader of the Bloc Québécois] said that in a society, attitudes fraught with hypocrisy and innuendo are not to be tolerated. If there is evidence, let it be known, do not let the rumour mill run. Rigour is required at all times... it is not right, be it directed at politicians or anyone else. There is nothing more harmful than rumour because it is not factual.
He also added:
If it turns out that the rumours were unfounded, those who floated them will have to face the consequences. What goes around comes around, warned [the leader of the Bloc].
I would like to have the opinion of the hon. member concerning this quote, in the context of the question of privilege—
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
The time has expired but I will give the hon. parliamentary secretary a brief opportunity to answer.
John Williams Conservative Edmonton—St. Albert, AB
Madam Speaker, on a point of order, if you are going to give the government side extra time, are you going to give the opposition members extra time when their time runs out too?
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
I am sure the member will not object to a 30 second answer.
John Williams Conservative Edmonton—St. Albert, AB
Madam Speaker, my question was, if you give the government extra time are you going to give the opposition extra time too?
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
If there is an opportunity for a 30 second answer with respect to the members we do stretch it for a 30 second answer.
Peter Adams Liberal Peterborough, ON
Madam Speaker, I know you are very polite to us all and we do appreciate that, but if the member opposite checked the blues, he would discover the opposition has already received these opportunities.
Claude Drouin Liberal Beauce, QC
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Gatineau for the relevancy of her question.
I only want to stress that further to the statements of the hon. member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, the Bloc members do not even dare apologize and they take the same stand. As I mentioned earlier, it should be noted that when the leader of the Bloc Québécois speaks, he addresses the people of the Parti Québécois and of the Bloc Québécois who are accusing one another without proof. This is what we see in the householders where people were attacked without proof. In addition, he cites the Gomery report which does not mention anyone specifically.
Robert Thibault LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health
Madam Speaker, I am happy to rise in this House to speak to this question of privilege.
We have had some debate on whether the document in question was or was not a prop, but everyone will agree that it was propaganda. I would go so far as to say that it was propaganda in the worst sense of the word: something that is not produced or distributed to inform anyone, but to influence people’s ideas, to misinform them and lead them to conclusions that are not strictly consistent with the facts.
They chose not to wait until Judge Gomery, a respected figure and a leader in his profession, had finished his work. He is a man with a great deal of experience and had access to all the documentation he wanted. He asked for millions of pages of documentation. For the first time in the history of our country, if I am not mistaken, he was immediately given cabinet and Privy Council documents, not only those of the current government, but those of the previous government. We said we were raising the curtain on secrets that are not normally divulged. Judge Gomery had access to all the expertise he asked for, whether accountants or lawyers. He summoned hundreds of witnesses and prepared his report.
And what did the Bloc Québécois choose to do? As a political party, they published this flyer bearing a photo of the leader, a letter from the leader and numerous references to the party. The matter was then raised here as a question of privilege. I acknowledge that, as a member of Parliament, I have certain privileges and certain rights. I also have responsibilities. I am given the tools to do my job. I have an office and the right to take a plane to visit my riding, which I did all last week. I have the right to send householders and parliamentary newsletters in which I can state my opinions. I can inform people about government programs. If I do not agree with the government's actions, I can also say so. I can give people an opportunity to contact me and tell me about their opinions and concerns.
I believe it is essential to be correct in terms of my responsibilities, to give all the information rather than to make allegations interspersed with photographs of people without any captions, which can only lead to suspicions of inappropriate acts. This kind of activity by a member has no place in Parliament. In this case, the judge has examined the facts and most of the people were exonerated.
Are we now going to do what should be done? Will the Bloc Québécois send the corrected information to those 26 ridings and 1.2 million households to tell them that the Prime Minister and all ministers from Quebec have been exonerated? To me, that would be the reasonable and respectful thing to do.
It is important that we show respect to one another here in the House. Our debates must remain honest and focused on the matters of the day, on the future and on our plans for our country and its communities. However, we know that what we are talking about right now is not necessarily in everyone's best interest.
Some people would like to destroy our institutions, to demean them, because these institutions represent our country and they do not want our country to work. Other people, who will ride on their coattails when it suits their political ambitions, will sometimes enter into socialist, separatist or opportunist alliances. They will seize any opportunity to demean our institutions. We experienced it at the time of the “beau risque”. We saw the Bloc coming.
Some say there have been scandals. To me, the worst scandal in the history of our country was when the Bloc formed the official opposition. A party whose objective was to destroy our country was the official opposition. They are here, they have been elected and they have the right to be here. They are entitled to their statements and their ideas. They have every right to take part in the debate, because they have been elected, just like me and just like you, Madam Speaker. However, they have the responsibility to be honest and to use the tools available to them carefully.
They must not use these tools just to spread propaganda and to attack individuals or their reputation. I do not agree with this practice.
I am told it may be slanderous it is so unethical. We should have our own sense of ethics. We should not have to refer to any documents. In my opinion, this is not ethical. There is no justification for this type of document that tarnishes reputations. These hon. members work hard for our country, for their province and their constituents in order to advance matters. The Bloc has decided to tarnish their reputations and to blame them. That is not right.
The Bloc will use any tool it can to tarnish our institutions because it is trying to convince people that every problem will be solved with Quebec's independence: dogs will smell better, blueberry season will last longer, and everything will be perfect in Quebec. However, nothing will change.
The Minister of the Environment summed it up quite nicely. The Bloc members said we should break up this country and destroy it for economic reasons because we had a deficit and a national debt. Now they are arguing that Canada has too much of a surplus and too many jobs. Too much money goes into the EI fund. We should now dissolve this country. In my opinion, this is the most successful country in the world. It is certainly one of the best places to live. According to them, those are the reasons we should break up this country. Nothing will stop them.
I understand why people from Quebec feel this way. However, I am also confident they will be realistic. They will consider this carefully. If we have an honest debate with all the information and a clear question, then we have to talk about the advantages that Canada offers to all residents of all the provinces. We must certainly never accept Canada as it is. We must always strive for better. We must see what we can do with our country in the future.
I think the people of Quebec, like those from Nova Scotia, will see that Canada is the best country, the best institution and the best tool we have for advancing our issues.
We use the argument of language and culture. One million French-speaking Canadians live outside Quebec. As an Acadian from Nova Scotia, I cannot imagine a Canada without Quebec, New Brunswick, Manitoba or Saskatchewan or without the francophones from British Columbia or from any other province or territory. They are all parts that make up this country. When we work together, when we help each other and give each other a hand, we can succeed in the international arena, as someone said earlier. We have had the value of cultural products recognized and had them removed from international trade negotiations in order to protect our institutions and our cultures.
I do not know if a small island or a small country of 8 million people could have as much success. With 30 million people, and that includes all of our people, we are not a very big country on the international scale. We have advantages, however, in this country, which I think works well and must continue to make progress.
This document is one of the tools being used to undermine credibility once again. Credibility is being destroyed by some parliamentarians, not by Parliament. It is the credibility of the Bloc Québécois which is in doubt with that publication. I would invite the Bloc to apologize and take corrective action. I think that it is time to get back to work and discuss important issues. In Nova Scotia, people want a budget and want to see the bills that are now before us get passed. That is what we should be discussing. Improvements are needed. I think that it is important to invest more in the seaports of the Atlantic provinces.
As for the Conservatives, who made an alliance with the Bloc, they have no interest in these issues since Atlantic Canada is barren ground for them and a “culture of defeatism”.
What has the Liberal Party done and what does it continue to do? We continue to invest in Atlantic Canada, not in a culture of defeatism. We continue to invest in the future and the gains of our champions.
We have seen incredible improvement. Canada is at its lowest rate of unemployment in 30 years. I have seen great improvement in Nova Scotia and all Atlantic Canada. I have talked to people who are fighting for the future. They have a dream of where they want to go. It is important we provide that.
All the discussion has been on Gomery and the sponsorship program. The sponsorship program was managed well in Nova Scotia. I am very proud of Liberal Party volunteers in Nova Scotia. I do not like the idea that people took advantage of the program. In my mind they are crooks. They are unethical people and they should be dealt with.
I am very proud of the institution to which I belong. Like Nova Scotians, I believe we should wait for the full report of Justice Gomery and the response of the Government of Canada on how we implement its measures and recommendations.
Nicole Demers Bloc Laval, QC
Madam Speaker, I want to say at the outset that I do not question the good faith of my colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health. I have had the opportunity to work with him on the Standing Committee on Health, and I do not doubt his good faith.
However, as he says, we need to be responsible, to show respect for our fellow citizens and to tell them the truth. It is a matter of respect, to support democracy and restore people's confidence in it. In fact, he should do so himself. He should stand and tell us the names of those who received money from Marc-Yvan Côté and who should not be here today. This would really respect democracy and restore people's confidence in democracy, because they have lost faith in it.
My colleague should have the courage to blow the whistle. I am sure that many Quebeckers and Canadians would be very proud of him.
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Madam Speaker, I was part of the former government. We referred all issues pertaining to the sponsorship program to the Auditor General. We encouraged the RCMP to get the facts. The current Prime Minister of Canada appointed Justice Gomery and created the Gomery commission. When he received the report, he referred it to the RCMP. I am in no way responsible for the issues raised by the member. The question of privilege raised by the member for Bourassa is the only question that must be addressed today.
Like my colleague, I recognize the importance of being respectful to each other. This document, this publication, does not show any respect. It is defamatory. It attacks individuals, their family, their honour and their reputation without giving any facts.
When Justice Gomery submitted his preliminary report, the first report of the facts, most of those individuals were exonerated. The Prime Minister and Quebec ministers were exonerated. Yes, mistakes were made in the Liberal Party in Quebec. Some individuals benefited from some situations and lined their pockets. We do not accept that. That is unacceptable. We do not defend the indefensible.
With this motion, we are trying to encourage people to respect the rules, the privileges of the House of Commons.
Denis Coderre Liberal Bourassa, QC
Madam Speaker, the leader of the Bloc Québécois has already received a formal demand from my lawyers, and the rest will soon follow.
However, I would like to ask a question of my colleague, who has the utmost respect for this institution and has its best interests at heart.
Does he find it acceptable that some people use taxpayers' money to produce libellous documents that contain false allegations or even criminal allegations? When he sends out this type of documents, does he think about the fact that people only want to be informed, that they do not want any smear campaign against members on either side of the House?
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Madam Speaker, if ever there was a lesson to be learned from the Gomery report, from the problems that resulted from the sponsorship program, it certainly has to do with the need to manage the taxpayers' money appropriately. It cannot be used for political or personal gain.
When one reads this type of document, one can see that its sole purpose is to sully the reputation of innocent people, namely members of the House, to score political points and to use public funds to mislead the public. This is totally unacceptable and unethical.
I certainly believe that this is indeed a question of privilege. The members and the party who sent out these householders should do what has to be done in these circumstances, and they should start by apologizing to the House.
Dave Batters Conservative Palliser, SK
Madam Speaker, the member for Etobicoke Centre talked about the important initiatives the government apparently has on the books which are of pressing importance. What Canadians and my colleagues in the Conservative Party of Canada are wondering is that it has been 12 years and if these initiatives were so important why have we not seen them. These important initiatives, according to the Liberal Party, include such things as the decriminalization of marijuana. Certainly no police officer that we talk to in this country wants to see that.
Canadians clearly are ready to render judgment on the government and the Conservative Party of Canada is ready to take immediate actions to address the real needs of Canadians.
The member for Acadie--Bathurst talked about the importance of voting, and I cannot emphasize that enough. I agree with him. It is extremely important for everyone to be motivated to vote in the upcoming federal election. It is important that we clean up this culture of entitlement and corruption that exists in the party opposite and let everybody know here today that, with the developments currently going on in Ottawa, if there is a Christmas campaign, the blame will rest on the shoulders of the Prime Minister of Canada and no one else.
I am very proud to rise today on behalf of the good people of Palliser to speak to the question of privilege put forward by the hon. member for Bourassa. The hon. member for Bourassa has asked that we no longer be permitted to discuss Canada's most important issue of the day, the sponsorship scandal, with Canadians. It is a tragedy that this is the important issue that is dominating the news but that is a tragedy of the government's making.
The Gomery report has not even looked at other scandals, other things that need to be delved into, such as the Prime Minister's contracting practices at Earnscliffe, which is the only area where it has been suggested that there may have been direct involvement in improper activities.
It is very difficult to see the members opposite and the member for Bourassa as victims, which is the way they portray themselves. The only victims in this entire mess are Canadian taxpayers, good, honest, hard-working people who send their money to Ottawa and want it to be used to address their priorities of health care, front line policing and a new equalization deal for Saskatchewan, a fair deal that would allow my province of Saskatchewan to retain its oil and gas revenues that rightfully belong to the people of Saskatchewan which only the Minister of Finance is against. Of the entire province of Saskatchewan, provincial representatives and federal representatives, only the finance minister refuses to stand up for the people of Saskatchewan. These are the issues people would like to see debated.
Those are the priorities which Canadians want their taxpayer dollars to go toward. Therefore it is difficult for Canadians to see the members opposite as victims. The member for Bourassa paints himself as a victim but it looks like the member for Roberval--Lac-Saint-Jean has hit a nerve and I guess some of the truth hurts.
Let us be very clear. Justice Gomery confirmed in his report that millions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars were stolen from the public treasury to benefit the Liberal Party of Canada. That money should have been put into the priorities of Canadians. Leaders of the Liberal Party must be held politically and democratically responsible. When we are fortunate enough to have the members on this side of the House on that side of the House, we can finally clean up this mess and ensure that guilty parties are prosecuted and people are charged and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. People in my riding would like to see Liberals go to jail for this scandal and that is when they will be satisfied.
Dave Batters Conservative Palliser, SK
Yes, the guilty ones will go to jail and there will be a lot of them.
It has been confirmed by Justice Gomery that there was political direction of the sponsorship program. This culture of entitlement is confirmed. Mr. Dingwall perhaps said it best when he stated, “I am entitled to my entitlements”. That is the attitude that exists among the Liberal members opposite. Justice Gomery specifically admonished the Liberals for equating the interests of the Liberal Party with those of national unity, and Canadians deserve better.
What people in my riding and Canadians throughout the country know is that even though some people were not directly fingered by Justice Gomery, a lot of wilful blindness went on. It is tough to track envelopes of money passed under the table in restaurants. There was a lot of wilful blindness on the part of members opposite and on the part of the Prime Minister of Canada.
It is clear that Liberals received kickbacks. The Liberal Party itself admits that it will repay $1.14 million that it stole. Since when do people in this country get to choose their penalty? Where is the punitive component if people just have to repay the money that was stolen? Clearly the government needs to step forward, do the right thing, sue the Liberal Party of Canada and recover the money.
Again, there needs to be a punitive component. If Liberal members opposite robbed a bank, they would not just have to give back the money bags. This is ridiculous. The Bloc Québécois puts the number of dollars that went directly to the Liberal Party of Canada at closer to $5.5 million. If truth be told, $40 million are unaccounted for. Canadians are incensed by this scandal.
What did the Prime Minister know about this scandal? I sat in my seat and watched as the Prime Minister of Canada one day was asked a very simple question: Did he ever have lunch with Mr. Claude Boulay of Groupe Everest and discuss sponsorship contracts? He refused to answer that question probably a dozen times, until a long term member of the House, I believe from Ottawa Centre, said that it was the most disgraceful thing he had ever seen in the history of this Parliament. That indicates some of what the Prime Minister may have known.
We know that when the Prime Minister was finance minister, his chief political aid, Lucie Castelli, picked up the phone and secured $250,000 for Serge Savard, the Prime Minister's golfing buddy who happened to raise $1 million for the Prime Minister's leadership bid. Did the Prime Minister not know about that? Canadians will be the judges of that. The people in my riding have already made up their minds based on sworn testimony and are ready to render their judgment.
Justice Gomery has used words such as “culture of entitlement” and the phrase “rotten to the core”. Clearly there is systemic corruption in the Liberal Party of Canada, the result of arrogance of a four term Liberal government. There is terrible abuse of Canadian tax dollars. The good people in Moose Jaw, Regina, Pense, Wilcox, Mossbank and Rouleau, hard-working taxpayers in this country, are incensed. The government needs to be held politically accountable. The Liberals may think that Canadians will simply forgive and forget but they will be wrong.
In 1997 the Liberal majority resulted perhaps because of the illegal money that helped the Liberals increase their seat count in Quebec. This money was used to illegally fight election campaigns. It breaks every rule in the book and Canadians know it.
I will paraphrase the member for Newmarket—Aurora. When she sat on this side of the House she said that the Prime Minister was the first mate on the good ship Chrétien before she decided to join that ship.
Canadians know that the Prime Minister was the finance minister and the vice-chair of the Treasury Board at that time. He was the one writing the cheques for the sponsorship program which has become the sponsorship scandal. Canadians will judge in the coming election what the Prime Minister truly knew about this scandal.
It is the culture of corruption. How many examples do we have to point to? Let us talk about the strippergate saga and the Dingwall affair with questions about his lobbyist activities. Let us talk about the misuse of the Challenger jet by the government. It is shameful. Let us talk about the immigration minister's ferocious appetite for pizza and the $138 bill for two people, which is more than a family of four spends in a week for groceries. Let us talk about the Minister of Foreign Affairs and his travelling chauffeur if we want to talk scandal. Let us talk about crony appointments to the Senate. Let us talk about André Ouellet from Canada Post. I can go on and on.
Pierre Pettigrew Liberal Papineau, QC
And you are the fifth party in Quebec.
Dave Batters Conservative Palliser, SK
The member is obviously upset about the chauffeur comment.
Palliser residents want Liberals in jail and only a Conservative Party government will ensure that those accused are charged and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. This, of course, is for the RCMP to handle. Again, we need to have a punitive component. It is not enough to simply repay the money that was stolen and slipped under the table in brown envelopes.
We in the Conservative Party of Canada are ready to face the electorate at any time and put our record and the honesty and integrity that exists with the Leader of the Opposition and this entire party against the members opposite who are steeped in corruption.
The sponsorship program--
Privilege
The Acting Speaker (Hon. Jean Augustine)
On a point of order, the member for Bourassa.
