Mr. Speaker, last December 18, the Prime Minister gave Larry Smith a patronage appointment to the Senate. The Conservatives like that word. He was paid for almost two months before even stepping foot in the chamber. Since the day he was sworn in, he has done very little there. As a member of the official languages committee, for example, he attended zero out of five meetings.
Would the Prime Minister like to take the opportunity, on this last day of his government, to come clean and admit that Mr. Smith's patronage appointment was merely a manoeuvre to subsidize a Conservative candidate's election campaign?