Madam Speaker, I can probably say that no one in the House knows more about Phoenix, unfortunately, than me, and perhaps my colleague for Regina—Lewvan. We have looked at this inside and out, and I have gone over probably 2,000 pages of ATIPs.
The government was told in advance not to go because the training was not done. We were told in advance to clear the backlog before we go and for the government not to do it. We were told in advance to do the training, but the government did not do that. On the issue about the terminating, we asked the minister and the previous minister how many of these employees were fired or terminated after October 2015. It was actually several hundred. Why were they laid off, if the government knew it was such a problem? Crickets, absolute crickets.
We asked the current minister that, and perhaps my colleague across the way wants to stick to “crickets” for his answer, instead of his accusations.
On the member's second point about the access to information law, the President of the Treasury Board stood up and said what a great job the Liberals have done and that it has been 35 years since the last time it happened. Sure, but the experts say it is horrible. The commissioner herself said that it is regressive and that the former government was a lot more open than the current government.
But, hey, it has been 35 years, and good on them for doing nothing. The Liberals can congratulate themselves for a great job of doing nothing.