Mr. Speaker, to my hon. colleague from Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, I am again going to point out that the differences are not so much differences but continuing evidence that companies like SNC-Lavalin, or the large corporate influencers in Canada, get through doors that other Canadians cannot get through, whether they are civil service doors or political election doors.
We heard the earlier example of the trip to Libya involving then Conservative foreign affairs minister John Baird. However, the elevation of the people associated with this scandal by former prime minister Stephen Harper includes Arthur Porter, who was implicated in a bribery scandal with SNC-Lavalin over the McGill hospital issue. He was given the highest security clearance in this country and was made the head of the Security Intelligence Review Committee by former prime minister Harper.
The man who was the chair of SNC-Lavalin through all of the dealings that are before the court at the moment, and who was also chair of the governance committee, was another one of Stephen Harper's most trusted and closest corporate friends. That was Gwyn Morgan. He has a career in the energy business, but Stephen Harper put him forward to be the head of the national public appointments commission.
My point here is not to attack any one individual, but to say that the pattern of government influence by corporations like SNC-Lavalin, regardless of who is in office, is a real problem. We should be getting at that. How do we root out what is essentially systemic levels of corruption, because our governments in general have become too beholden to corporate interests and influence?