Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Sherbrooke, Serge Cardin.
I am pleased to rise today to speak to the Bloc Québécois motion inviting the House of Commons to express “its full and complete confidence in Elections Canada and the Commissioner of Canada Elections”. The motion introduced by my colleague, the hon. member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, has proven necessary because the Elections Canada investigation shows that this government has very little in the way of morals and ethics.
Indeed, while the Conservatives were campaigning vigorously on the need to clean up the government, it appears that they deliberately violated election laws in the hopes of convincing voters to place their trust in them.
As you can see, I will address the motion, unlike the member who spoke previously. I would say that the motion we are debating here today is especially necessary because, ever since this government has been under investigation, the Conservatives have been trying to undermine the credibility and integrity of Elections Canada using attacks that are dishonest and misguided.
These attacks are very serious and demonstrate this government's lack of transparency on the issue. They are serious because they are an attack on the very principle of democracy. In any democracy, the concept of free and honest elections is a fundamental principle. I am not referring only to the right to vote, but also to the rules that establish and enable free, democratic and honest elections.
There are many of these rules; for example, they govern contributions to political parties, in order to avoid having wealthy people and corporations fund a candidate's election campaign, thereby buying an MP who will look out for their individual or corporate interests instead of the interests of all citizens.
There also are rules setting election spending limits. These rules exist to prevent giving one candidate an advantage because he is able to spend more than his opponents and plaster his riding with his party advertisements.
In democratic societies, an election cannot be bought. There are rules, and they must be followed. This government did not do so during the last election. For these rules to work, they must be enforced by an organization that operates independently of the government. In Quebec, the Chief Electoral Officer of Quebec is responsible for this. For federal elections, it is Elections Canada.
In a democracy, the government does not interpret and enforce election legislation. The organization that oversees elections must remain absolutely independent of the government. What the Conservative Party is trying to do now is to control this institution. Elections Canada reports directly to Parliament so that it is protected from any pressure from the government.
Confidence in Elections Canada, the independent organization that oversees federal elections, is completely indispensable. But in response to the overwhelming arguments made by Elections Canada, the Conservatives want to hide all these allegations. We saw that in the remarks of the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, who completely avoided discussing this motion.
We can understand that the Conservatives are embarrassed about their actions. Not only did they come up with a fraudulent scheme in order to claim rebates to which they were not entitled, but now instead of admitting guilt and cooperating with Elections Canada representatives, they have decided to attack the credibility of Elections Canada for blatantly partisan purposes.
They have chosen confrontation, which has forced Elections Canada to take extraordinary action in asking the RCMP to go to Conservative Party headquarters to access incriminating documents.
In these irregularities under the Canada Elections Act—an unfortunate matter for parliamentary democracy—we now know that the Conservative Party, during the 2006 election campaign, transferred funds and invoices from the party to some candidates in order to get around spending limits. In return, the candidates having agreed to take part in this scheme became eligible for up to a 60% rebate from Elections Canada. This scheme likely allowed the party to exceed the limit for that election by more than $1 million.
The Conservatives are now claiming that they are being unfairly attacked by Elections Canada. They are going so far as to talk about retaliation by Elections Canada, saying that the organization is seeking revenge for the Conservative Party's lawsuit on behalf of the dozens of candidates who were denied rebates for election expenses.
This argument does not hold water for anyone who is informed. In fact, let us admit that the Elections Canada investigation is revealing in a number of ways.
During the election campaign this party declared the importance of and need for cleaning up government, but we have just heard a speech by a minister who is quite simply denying that there is any form of retaliation against Elections Canada.
The Conservatives got elected in 2006 by maintaining that they would be the best party to change the culture of patronage criticized by Justice Gomery. We all remember that. Now, two years later, that same Justice Gomery is criticizing the actions of the Conservatives.
In addition to the irregularities under the Canada Elections Act, we could also talk about the contracts awarded to cronies. For example, the Minister of Finance has acknowledged granting—without calling for tenders—a $122,000 contract to Hugh MacPhie, a former Mike Harris aide. We could list many other cases of political interference in favour of cronies or for partisan appointments.
As we saw in the Flaherty and Cadman cases—