Mr. Speaker, I think that, from now on, we will be able to speak properly and intelligently.
I wonder why the Liberal members are opposed to such householders and are asking us to apologize, by trying to make us feel guilty. We must recall the facts set out in the Gomery report, in page after page, all the testimony heard by the Gomery commission, all the oral questions we have asked in the House since the report was tabled and all the non-answers we have received from the ministers. We must remember everything we have heard about the $100 million scandal, friends, advertising firms which we could name: Groupaction, Gosselin, Groupe Everest, Lafleur Marketing, Vickers & Benson, Polygone/Expour—we know this company better—and Coffin Communication. All these agencies received money during the sponsorship scandal and contributed to the Liberal Party.
Our integrity is being called into question, when nine candidates accepted brown envelopes containing dirty money. The president of the party was quite right in saying that we should plug our noses when we talk about the Liberals. He may have said it best, except for the member for Bourassa, who said that the guilty parties must be punished. But have they truly been punished? We know that the person who gave the money to Marc-Yvan Côté has been banned for life from the Liberal Party, as was Mr. Côté. The nine other candidates who accepted this money are still there, with the ministers and the members. Perhaps they will run in the next election. And we are being asked to apologize for this.
The parliamentary householders were sent in compliance with the rules of the House and the rules of the game. Let us look at what these householders say. They say that four ministers—three still in office and one former minister—appeared before the Gomery commission. This is a fact. The leader was wondering why these householders did not publish the photos of the other ministers. It is because they did not appear before the Gomery commission. This is also a fact.
The debate is about the sponsorship scandal. It opens the door to discussion about what happened at the Gomery commission. We are taking advantage of this open door. The more we talk about it, the more people in Quebec and Canada will realize what really happened on the Liberal side and will understand that this is an institutionalized and controlled system.
Let us look at Justice Gomery's major findings: The first one is that there is “clear evidence of political involvement in the administration of the Sponsorship Program“. Whose political involvement was it? Then, the report talks about “insufficient oversight at the very senior levels of the public service“. We could quote from the report to show that the former president of the Treasury Board, whom we heard, failed to do her duty: “a veil of secrecy surrounding the administration of the Sponsorship Program and an absence of transparency in the contracting process“. Who is hiding behind this veil? Who holds the secret?
The report goes on talking about:
reluctance, for fear of reprisal, by virtually all public servants to go against the will of a manager [Chuck Guité] who was circumventing established policies and who had access to senior political officials;
gross overcharging by communication agencies for hours worked and goods and services provided;
inflated commissions, production costs and other expenses charged by communication agencies and their subcontractors, many of which were related businesses;
the use of the Sponsorship Program for purposes other than national unity or federal visibility [which means filling the pockets of cronies] because of a lack of objectives, criteria and guidelines for the Program.
Among the cronies were the ones from the cigar club. We all remember who belonged to that club. I continue quoting from the report:
deliberate actions to avoid compliance with federal legislation and policies, including the Canada Elections Act, Lobbyists Registration Act, the Access to Information Act and Financial Administration Act--
Members opposite talk about transparency. Nevertheless, when questions are asked in committee and access is needed to some documents, for example about the Canadian Unity Council or the Internationaux du sport de Montréal in November 2005, the same veil applies and members of Parliament cannot get answers to their questions.
The Gomery report goes on to say:
—a complex web of financial transactions among Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC), Crown Corporations and communication agencies, involving kickbacks and illegal contributions to a political party—
This party is called the Liberal Party. And today, we are asked to apologize.
However, the Gomery report clearly states, “—involving kickbacks and illegal contributions to a political party—”. We are not talking about $1 million; it is much more than that.
Money was diverted in the sponsorship scandal, but a mere $1 million is being reimbursed, and we are asked to say thank you and sorry because the Liberals are such nice people. Excuse me, but enough is enough.
Here is another excerpt from the Gomery report:
Five agencies that received large sponsorship contracts regularly channelling money, via legitimate donations or unrecorded cash gifts, to political fundraising activities in Quebec, with the expectation of receiving lucrative government contracts;
We have the opportunity to talk about the Gomery report. Lets us continue to do so. We were told that they accept the report's findings, which are:
Certain agencies carrying on their payroll individuals who were, in effect, working on Liberal Party matters;
Those agencies received money and paid so-called volunteers working in Montreal. And what were those employees working on? Illegal election campaigns.
Some members in this House were elected thanks to election workers who were illegally paid. Some received envelopes and campaigned with money obtained illegally.
Here is another excerpt from the Gomery report. We read:
The existence of a “culture of entitlement” among political officials and bureaucrats involved with the Sponsorship Program—
We are being asked to refer to the Gomery report. For the benefit of the member for Ahuntsic, I will quote the report:
A pattern of activity whereby a public servant in retirement did extensive business with former recipients of Sponsorship Program contracts; and
Here is the most important part:
the refusal of Ministers, senior officials in the Prime Minister’s Office and public servants to acknowledge their responsibility for the problems of mismanagement that occurred.
This is what Justice Gomery says on page 7 of his document.
He talks about the refusal of ministers. Among others, the President of the Treasury Board, or presidents, should have ensured that the money was well spent. Justice Gomery puts it clearly: “the refusal of Ministers ... for the problems of mismanagement that occurred”.
If the ministers had fulfilled their responsibilities, if they had put in place all the controls to properly manage the public administration and money, the laws would have been respected.
Justice Gomery says the following on page 19 of his report:
The Treasury Board exercises its oversight role most actively through its review of submissions for spending initiatives.
The principal expenditure controls are found in legislation, especially sections 32, 33 and 34 of the Financial Administration Act. In brief, section 32 ensures that funds are available to pay for any goods or services contracted; section 33 deals with requisitions for payment; and section 34 ensures that no payment for goods or services requisitioned by the government shall be made unless there is a certification on record that the goods or services have been supplied in accordance with the government contract which authorized the expenditure.
It is very clear that Treasury Board has the tools to ensure that a scandal such as the one we are talking about today—and that we have been talking about for too long—does not occur. As the justice pointed out, and I will conclude on this note, the ministers' refusal to admit their responsibility for the mismanagement is unacceptable, and this is why we are going to continue talking about the sponsorship scandal.