I am sorry, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member says he cannot hear me. I will be glad to speak up a bit so that he can hear every single word of these condemnations. If he continues, I will take a moment to wait until he gets his seat so that I can mention this to him personally, if he wants to continue this back and forth.
The presentation refers to pre-writ weeks and March 15. Yet the Prime Minister has been telling people that he does not want an election and that it is the irresponsible coalition that wants the election because it does not care about Canadians. He claims he is telling Canadians the truth that he does not want an election, yet the Conservatives' own documents make it very clear that we are now in the pre pre-writ period and that all of this will culminate in an election. It looks like an election is coming.
I so hope that in this period, when we talk about integrity and honesty, we will get a chance to talk about what has happened with KAIROS. This issue itself is enough for this government to be condemned for denying funding for church groups that are doing excellent humanitarian work. I have not yet heard a criticism of the work KAIROS does other than some false things from the government. That alone is an issue, but let me take it to the next step, to the Minister of International Cooperation.
I have a copy of a document with three signatures. The first one is of the acting vice-president of the Canadian partnership branch of CIDA. Under that signature is the signature of the president, and I am assuming that is the president of the Canadian partnership branch. Just above the signature lines is the recommendation:
—that you [meaning the minister] sign below to indicate you approve a contribution of $7,098,758 over four years to the above program.
Might I also just note that on this page it also says:
Primary local partner—the organization works with 23 well-established local partners trusted by KAIROS.
The benefits this organization shows for that work that it does are just exponential.
Anyway, the two officials who signed the document recommended that funding be approved. After these senior people signed the document recommending the funding to the minister, the minister either personally inserted the word “not” or personally directed that it be inserted.
I want to give KAIROS credit on this. I saw one of its t-shirts that said “KAIROS is going away”, but it had the word “not” in a red circle. The t-shirt was out within 48 hours, which I thought was brilliant.
They changed this after those people signed the document--