Mr. Speaker, I think for the record we should point out that the vote in committee on the recommendation to the Prime Minister about Mr. Murray was seven to four. There were members from the three opposition parties; it was not only one opposition party. It was all committee members, those from the NDP, the Bloc Québécois and the Conservative Party, who recommended that Mr. Murray not be appointed to this position and said that he was not qualified to do the job.
If the vote had been close, if it had been only one party, it would be different, but the vote was seven to four, unanimous from the opposition parties, and the fact is that the Prime Minister stated repeatedly during the election that he would end patronage and cronyism and deal with the democratic deficit.
The simple fact is that this was just a waste of time for the committee in regard to the Prime Minister actually sending this appointment for review by or recommendation of the committee. The Prime Minister received the recommendation not to appoint Mr. Murray and completely disregarded it. I think that fact has to be made clear.
The vote was seven to four that Mr. Murray not be appointed to this position. What is the Prime Minister's word worth? It is a fair question. When the Prime Minister makes these commitments throughout the election, does his word have any value or does he only say what he needs to say to get votes at the time and then once he is in power it does not matter?
We are seeing this pattern from one file to another. I have the same situation in my riding with respect to a tax matter. The Prime Minister made commitments throughout the election, but once he got here it did not matter.
I want to defend the committee. I am not a member of the committee. The committee members took the extraordinary step of bringing their recommendation to Parliament after reviewing this file in good faith. After making a recommendation that was completely disregarded, I think the committee was left with the only possible thing to do and that was to bring this matter before the House.