Madam Speaker, to answer that question, I ask people to imagine a world in which a prime minister is able to interfere in criminal prosecutions to have charges set aside. Imagine if that were a regular occurrence, if powerful people accused of crimes could knock on the door of the PMO and ask to have charges dropped and the prime minister picked up the phone or met in person with the attorney general and said “make it happen”. What kind of world would we live in if that were how justice is administered? Why would we even have a prosecutor or a judge for that matter, if prime ministers and other politicians had the ability to shelf charges? It is a massive concept.
It is mind-boggling that the Prime Minister thought this was okay. He and his team contacted her 20 times. She documented it. She said there were veiled threats. She was hounded, in her words. She compared it to the Saturday night massacre, which is a reference to Richard Nixon's firings to cover up Watergate.
This is not a Conservative spewing these allegations. This is a Liberal, the former attorney general appointed by the Prime Minister. That is incredibly serious.
He tried to shut down a criminal trial earlier and now he is trying to shut down an investigation of this today. We will not let him. We are convening the ethics committee. It is beginning its investigation. He better show up and answer some questions.