Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Nepean—Carleton talks about his experience at a committee. My experience at the access to information and privacy committee was very similar.
When the justice minister was making his proposals for amendments to the Access to Information Act, I took the time to review the document. It was a lengthy document, probably 30 or 40 pages. About halfway through the document, I noticed one sentence at the top of a particular page. If it had been adopted by the House, it would have done exactly what the hon. member said. It would have prevented the sponsorship scandal from ever being exposed.
The sentence basically stated that if consultants were hired by a minister of the Crown, that information would be excluded from access to information requests. Yet I draw to the attention of the House that it was that kind of information which tipped off the Auditor General several years ago. That is when she began her investigation on what has become known as the sponsorship scandal. If that little sentence had been adopted in law, as proposed by the Liberal Minister of Justice, those kinds of sponsorship scandals or other possible corruptions, which perhaps are going on as we speak, would never have come to public light. That is how the Liberals play the game.