Mr. Speaker, I have been on the public record many times saying that I do not support any person or any individual who in any way compromises, interferes or attempts to delay the work and proceedings of Mr. Justice Gomery.
However, one point made by the member for Central Nova is misleading. He talks about this section (k) and he talks about other inquiries. This is a very common clause that is used in all inquiries. I will go over a few of them: the Arar inquiry; the Ipperwash inquiry; the Walkerton inquiry; the Stonechild inquiry; and the Grange inquiry. All of these were inquiries set up by the Conservative government, except for the Stonechild inquiry, which was set up by an NDP government.
I believe that our present Prime Minister deserves a lot of credit for taking the steps that he has and for establishing the public inquiry. I want to point out to the member for Central Nova that this was not always the case and I will specifically talk about his previous leader, the Right Hon. Brian Mulroney. After Mr. Mulroney left office, he took $300,000 in cash in envelopes in hotel rooms with the lights turned down, as reported by William Kaplan. Mr. Mulroney laughed at Canadians and said, “It's none of your business. I paid taxes on it”.
That shows the behaviour of and the credit that this House owes to our Prime Minister in taking all the steps that he did, including this inquiry. I think the inquiry should be allowed to proceed immediately, without delay, without compromise and without any further motions like this from the opposition.