Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to the motion which reads:
That this House call on the Government to amend section (k) of the Gomery Commission's terms of reference to allow the Commissioner to name names and assign responsibility.
Clause (k) of the Gomery commission terms of reference reads as follows:
the Commissioner be directed to perform his duties without expressing any conclusion or recommendation regarding the civil or criminal liability of any person or organization and to ensure that the conduct of the inquiry does not jeopardize any ongoing criminal investigation or criminal proceedings;
As a result of clause (k), Justice Gomery is expressly forbidden to name any person or organization as being responsible for part of the sponsorship scandal. While it is important for Justice Gomery to file his report, the Canadian people have already heard first hand the abuse of the program and the outright thievery by the Liberal Party.
Let me take a few moments to remind my colleagues and all Canadians of the facts of the sponsorship scandal.
It is well documented that the Prime Minister has promised Canadians he would get to the bottom of the sponsorship scandal. It is also well documented that the Prime Minister claims he had no knowledge whatsoever of any wrongdoing. We continually find through various testimony and documentation that this is simply not the case.
Recently the Prime Minister made a pathetic televised plea to Canadians that it was necessary to have Justice Gomery issue his report before an election. This is just another example of dithering and flip-flopping. One example of this was when he called the last federal election for June 2004.
While he said that he was the one who set up the Gomery inquiry, it was also he who took the sponsorship file out of the hands of the public accounts committee. It was he who prorogued the House. Why did he do that?
He ignored the parliamentary process in allowing the public accounts committee to examine all witnesses and release its findings on the sponsorship scandal. He called a snap election before Justice Gomery could ever hear from a witness, let alone create a report for Canadians to know the truth. He told Canadians that those who were involved in stealing their hard earned tax dollars would be held responsible.
The reality of this is that it was the Prime Minister who handcuffed Justice Gomery before his inquiry even began.
Skeptical Canadians only gave the Prime Minister a minority government with which to work. As a result, he was forced to follow through on his commitment to allow Justice Gomery and the sponsorship inquiry to continue. What he strategically omitted from the inquiry's mandate was that Justice Gomery had no ability to point the finger and assign blame.
By including clause (k), the Prime Minister is not allowing Justice Gomery to name names in his final report. This will deny Canadians everything the Prime Minister has promised. Another Liberal promise made, another Liberal promise broken.
This is the worst scandal in Canadian history, but it is not a Canadian scandal or a Quebec scandal. It is a Liberal scandal. Hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money was misappropriated, laundered and mysteriously ended up in Liberal pockets. Even worse, it is Liberal thievery that has strengthened separatist sentiments in Quebec.
If the Prime Minister has nothing to hide and is sincere about getting to the bottom of the sponsorship scandal, he should have no problem allowing Justice Gomery to name the individuals who are responsible. If the Prime Minister's track record of breaking promises holds true, then I would doubt his sincerity.
Since this sponsorship scandal began, week after week, month after month, we have been continually shocked by the depth of Liberal corruption. Just last week we learned from a forensic audit, performed at the request of Justice Gomery, of yet another $100 million that was funnelled through the sponsorship program. That makes 350 million questionable dollars so far spent by the Liberal government, not to mention millions more on an inquiry that will be able to do nothing more than state the obvious.
Money was stolen from Canadians and this money ended up in the pockets of the Liberal Party and its friends. We know that a separate fund has been set up for $750,000. However, we also realize, through sworn testimony in recent weeks, that number could be as high as $2.5 million and continuing to grow.
Now we find out that the Prime Minister finds it necessary to use another million dollars and counting of taxpayer money for his Gomery war room. The Prime Minister wants Canadians to believe the scandal has nothing to do with the current Liberal government. Testimony states otherwise.
In June 1999 the current Prime Minister's Office called the sponsorship program to lobby for a specific firm. Former public works minister and the man in charge of the sponsorship program, Alfonso Gagliano, claimed that the current Prime Minister was fully aware of the sponsorship program.
The man charged with issuing the sponsorship contracts, Chuck Guité, said that the current Prime Minister intervened in the contracting process. Claude Boulay, a man in the centre of the sponsorship scandal, detailed his relationship with the Prime Minister. Mr. Boulay's wife, Diane Deslauriers, the queen of Liberal fundraising in Quebec, also outlined her relationship with the current Prime Minister.
Alain Renaud has stated under oath that the Prime Minister's assistant lobbied for Groupaction to receive sponsorship money. Jean Brault has admitted to funnelling $1.1 million to the Liberal Party. He has also admitted to having campaign workers on his payroll to disguise their source of income.
The director general of the Liberal Party in Quebec, Benoît Corbeil, has confirmed that he received money from Jean Brault to pay campaign workers during the 2000 election. Daniel Dezainde admitted that Mr. Gagliano referred him to Joe Morselli and the Prime Minister's chief of staff, Jean-Marc Bard, for the financial needs of the party. Jacques Corriveau admitted to receiving about $8 million in commission on sponsorship projects for little or no work. The testimony goes on and on.
However, this testimony, along with many more facts, would be absolutely worthless if Justice Gomery's mandate is not expanded. If this is the case, then why, under pressure, did the Prime Minister create a trust fund to repay stolen money? The Prime Minister has already protected his interest by not letting the Gomery inquiry investigate public opinion research.
In a recent public accounts committee, when I questioned a Liberal strategist and former chief of staff to the Minister of Public Works, Warren Kinsella, along with Allan Cutler, the whistleblower in this sponsorship scandal, they confirmed that the Prime Minister was privy to information of contract fixing to a firm he has close ties to, Earnscliffe. This would never be revealed at the Gomery inquiry because the mandate conveniently excluded its ability to investigate public opinion research contracts. However, the Auditor General agreed that public opinion research contracting had serious flaws.
Just last week, the findings of the forensic audit shed light on the underhanded procurement of public opinion contracts. This is all information that will never be found in Justice Gomery's final report because the Prime Minister does not want it there. This is not what the Prime Minister promised Canadians when he created the Gomery inquiry.This is not what he continues to promise Canadians. The Prime Minister's promises are nothing more than empty words.
On a daily basis, the Prime Minister or his minions stand in this House and claim that Canadians need all the facts of the Gomery inquiry before they pass judgment. Yet, they will not allow Justice Gomery to lay blame where it belongs. Let us give Canadians a chance to know all the facts, not just the ones the Prime Minister is comfortable with.
The real injustice would be not allowing Canadians to know who stole their money, who let this happen, and who turned a blind eye to it. That is why this motion must pass.