Mr. Speaker, when I was on the finance committee, when I first came to Parliament, people said that I would get my orders from the PMO or someone else. At no time did I ever have anyone tell me what to do.
In fact, I remember a number of occasions when I was on the finance committee and I asked harder questions than the opposition. There was a couple of times when journalists said that it seemed the member from Winnipeg Centre asked some questions that were even tougher than what the member for Milton asked or the member who was the former leader in the House for the second opposition from Rimouski.
I also remember having some discussions with my colleagues who sometimes did not like my questions. However, I was not there to please my colleagues. I was there to get to the truth.
Every member here is independent. At least, I assume we are. I heard that under previous governments, perhaps under the Stephen Harper government, that things were a bit more “by the book”, that members were told what to do. They took their orders. The government at that time would take people out of a committee and replace them with “ringers”, as they called them. Know what? I have never been replaced.