Mr. Speaker, shame on them. Shame on them for using security to try to avoid accountability. These meetings are supposed to be about austerity, about fiscal restraint. Here is a good place to start. Do not spend more than a billion dollars on 72 hours of meetings.
While the government slashes money from women's groups, international aid and others, it tosses more than a billion dollars in debt for three days of meetings because the Conservatives tried to stick them in a cabinet minister's riding. While the rest of the world did this for a fraction of the cost, they ran up the bill.
What is the government's excuse? If the minister knew these costs all along, why did he not do something to contain them? Why are we spending many times more than the rest of the world?