Mr. Speaker, I stand to express a few thoughts on this very important issue.
I have been a parliamentarian for over 20 years and whether it was inside the Manitoba legislature or my short stay here in the House of Commons, one of the most serious issues we deal with is being truthful. We like to consider all of us as being honourable members. At the end of the day, we in the opposition anticipate that if we ask questions, we will be given truthful answers.
The leader of the Liberal Party and many others in the House asked questions specifically of the Prime Minister about an issue that has been on the minds of many Canadians from coast to coast to coast. Those were questions dealing with corruption within the PMO and the serious allegations that have flowed from the actions that Mr. Nigel Wright is alleged to have taken, including writing a $90,000 cheque; something which members of the Liberal Party have been calling for the government to provide a copy of.
Over the summer months we found out more detailed information with regard to what the Prime Minister could have or should have known. What we found out over the summer is that, indeed, there is reason to believe the Prime Minister did in fact deliberately mislead the House, and that is a very serious allegation. It is serious when an allegation is made against any member of the House of Commons, but we are talking about the Prime Minister of Canada. Did the Prime Minister of Canada intentionally and deliberately mislead the House? That is the question being posed today.
Throughout the years when allegations like this have been brought forward, what do we often see? We will see the person against whom the allegation has been made stand in his or her place and provide clarification as to whether he or she had intentionally misled the House. That is what I would like the Prime Minister to do. The Prime Minister had a choice. After all, he prorogued the session. He had a choice as to when he was going to come back to the House of Commons, when he was going to be accountable on this important issue. He chose to have the throne speech yesterday. What I and members of the Liberal Party would like to see is the Prime Minister stand in his place today and deal with this issue head-on. He owes it not only to parliamentarians but to each and every Canadian.
Canadians are concerned. They want a prime minister that is going to be honest and transparent. What happened? Did the Prime Minister's staff, as has been pointed out, not tell the Prime Minister? Did the chief of staff and the most important individuals in the Prime Minister's Office keep the Prime Minister completely in the dark so he had no idea what was happening? It appears as if there were more than one or two people who knew about it in the Prime Minister's Office. Did the Prime Minister in fact mislead Canadians?
Ultimately, I believe that the Prime Minister needs to stand in his place and give an explanation. Even if he takes longer to allow the issue to die down, which is maybe what he is hoping for, it is not going to happen. How much did we spend, maybe $1 million, for yesterday's throne speech? It was absolutely not necessary. We spent an excessive amount of money on a throne speech. Having said that, when matters of privilege have been raised against members, they are afforded the opportunity to respond. We would like the Prime Minister to respond to this.
In short, the Liberal Party is concerned that the assertions—