Debates of Oct. 20th, 2020

Opposition Motion—Special committee on anti-corruption

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my esteemed colleague from Laurentides—Labelle for the question.

Again, that is a planted question that was not planted. I was not made aware of it in advance, which makes it more fun.

The government's strategy is more or less systematically the same. If someone triggers an election during the pandemic they are the bad guy and should be sanctioned and punished for triggering an election. The government keeps saying that we have to support everything it does even when it does not make sense, otherwise we will be responsible for triggering an election.

We are not going to back down. We will stand up for our values and our convictions. We will vote in favour of what is best for Quebec and we will vote against what is not good for Quebec. Shedding light on the WE Charity scandal is good for Quebec so we will vote in favour of the motion. Burying the WE Charity affair in a false analysis of COVID-19 spending would not be good for Quebec, so we are voting against that.

If the Liberals decide to make this a confidence vote, it's their neck on the line, not mine.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I am very proud to be here to speak on behalf of the people of Timmins—James Bay.

We are currently in the midst of an unprecedented economic and health crisis. The pandemic has disrupted our economy. This morning, the Liberal government declared its intent to plunge Canada into an election to avoid questions about the WE Charity scandal and the Prime Minister's family. That is not acceptable. The government must stop shutting down committees and start collaborating with the other parties to explain the WE Charity scandal to Canadians. That is why I am here.

I would like to read a quote:

It has come to this, Mr. Speaker. In order for members of the House to do our jobs and make informed decisions...we need to pry scraps of relevant information out of the Conservatives' clenched fists and drag it out of them as they kick and scream at committee.

Who said that? It was our Prime Minister, in 2011. Remember that man? That man was open by default. He was the man who told the Canadian people that his would be the government of transparency. That was around the time the Prime Minister was the youth critic for the Liberal Party. He fessed up that while he was the youth critic, he had a side gig of charging massive amounts of money to speak to young people for his private business.

It was fascinating when the Prime Minister had to explain how much money he was making running his side business while acting as a member of Parliament. He listed about 28 public speaking events. I thought it was pretty extraordinary to get paid $10,000 to talk to young people when every member of the House does it for free because we believe it is our job. However, we found out yesterday in the release of documents that, no, our Prime Minister did not speak 28 times and get paid for it; it was more like 128 times. We just found that out yesterday because the government was forced to turn over documents.

We are here because of a series of decisions, made at the cabinet level by senior Liberal politicians, that threw off so much of the good work and goodwill in the first wave of the pandemic. I remember those first frightening days in March, when we did not know what was happening and our offices were dealing with Canadians who were trapped all over the world trying to get home. We were trying to answer questions on COVID, and every morning our Prime Minister stood out in front of his house and reassured the Canadian people. Every morning in my home we stopped what we were doing to listen to our Prime Minister speak. I was so proud that in Canada we were showing a unity of spirit.

I remember the press conference on April 8, when the Prime Minister responded to pressure that the New Democrats had been putting on him to deal with the crisis facing university students. Post-secondary students are not only facing massive levels of student debt from years of Liberal and Conservative indifference. They also have huge loans because of the fees they have to pay for university. They knew they had no work coming up this summer, so the ability of post-secondary students to continue their studies was a serious issue.

We heard from some Conservative media people too. They wondered: Are we going to pay students so they can sit in a hammock and smoke pot all summer? What disrespect for students, who are coming out of university with $50,000 or $100,000 of debt.

We pushed the Prime Minister for action, and on April 8 he said very clearly that he would have a plan to help university students. It was a promise, and we are going to get into what happened between April 8 and April 22, when the Prime Minister and his team decided that instead of helping university students across Canada, they would help their friends the Kielburgers. I say this because when the scandal broke and it became clear that the money that should have gone to help university students was being diverted to a group that had close financial ties to the Prime Minister's family, Canadians from coast to coast balked.

What did the Prime Minister do? He pulled that money. None of that money ever flowed. He took that money away from university students, who deserve better.

What we are being told today, after the Liberals prorogued and shut down our committees, after two weeks of blocking our work at the ethics and finance committees, is that the Liberals are ready to plunge this nation into an election. We are in the worst medical and economic crisis in a century. The second wave of this pandemic is already much more serious than the first. We have much more insecurity economically right now, yet this Prime Minister is willing to plunge the nation into the uncertainty of an election when we know that the vectors for the virus could easily be magnified a thousand times by polling and people going door to door, and having to do the jobs of a democratic election, but also leaving Canada without any leadership for the coming three months.

Why is that? It is to avoid giving answers about the WE scandal.

We are here this morning because the Conservatives put their offer on the table. We had gone to the government and said that we needed to get focused. The government cannot continue to avoid questions on the WE scandal and the misspending that happened, and we need to get answers. We cannot have our committees prorogued. We cannot have them filibustered. We asked, in good faith, to set up a committee where we could deal with this so that the finance committee could do its work, House procedures could do its work and ethics could do its work. Boy oh boy, I would love to be sitting at the ethics committee and looking at issues like the importance of getting legislation on facial recognition technology.

We reached out to the Liberals and said, “Let us get a committee in place.” The Liberals said they would get us a committee. It would be chaired by Liberals and dominated by Liberals. The Liberals would then get to do what they do at all the other committees they do not like: They would just monkey-wrench them and shut them down. That is not going to work.

Now the Conservatives have come forward with their anti-corruption motion. As always with the Conservatives, they cannot just come forward with a motion that is something that will pass the nod test with Canadians. Not only was it called the anti-corruption motion, and now they are having to walk that back, but the Conservatives had to start naming a bunch of people who have never actually been charged with corruption. Frank Baylis, a former member of Parliament, sat on the ethics committee with me. I know Frank. I do not know anything about Frank's business, and I do not know if Frank has done anything corrupt. That is something to be found out. However, I find it very uncomfortable when I see people's names being thrown around just because they happen to be Liberals. We can do better than that. The Conservatives have a motion on the table, and it is a very serious motion. We need to get this work done.

Of course, there is actually a third option, which the New Democrats have put forward. It is trying to get, between these two old-line parties, a sense of responsibility in the middle of a pandemic: that we have a committee that has the ability to call for documents. That is unlike the House leader, who said that calling for documents would put thousands of civil servants at risk in the middle of a pandemic. Wow. I have heard a lot of whoppers over the years in the House of Commons, but that is going to rank up there in my top 10 favourites: the right of parliamentarians to get documents is somehow putting not hundreds, but thousands, at risk. We are saying no: that another committee, if it is struck, has the right to get documents.

We agree that perhaps the Conservatives demanding that all the documents be turned over in 12 hours, or 15 or 20, is kind of ridiculous. A committee can decide what is reasonable. We also said that given the fact that we saw, under SNC-Lavalin, how the Liberal chair did such an extraordinary job of shutting it down and squashing it, we cannot trust a Liberal chair.

Now I can see that the Conservatives are very wary of our friend from Carleton who keeps taking over the chair at his own committee. They probably do not want that either. Therefore, let us have an opposition chair and let us vote on it. Let us vote on someone who all parties can agree would be a good, solid opposition chair. That way we would know that we could get the job done. That is about working together. That is the offer that is on the table.

In terms of the documents, we have made a number of suggestions. For example, at the ethics committee I put a motion of an amendment to my hon. colleague from Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes. We said we understand the Prime Minister has drawn a line in the sand about his family, and the fact that the WE group was paying Margaret and Sacha Trudeau.

We know they got paid. There is no surprise there. We were told they were not paid. That was false. The WE group asked the Kielburgers if the Trudeau family was being paid and was told they were not being paid. We have to ask ourselves what was going on at WE Charity that the board of directors tried to find out whether Margaret and Sacha were being paid and was falsely told they were not being paid. We went from being told they were not being paid anything to being told they were paid an extraordinary amount of money. That is a key issue in terms of the overall question of the conflict of interest facing the Prime Minister, because my colleagues in the Liberal party have gone out of their way to try and read the Conflict of Interest Act to say that family members, such as a mother or brother, cannot be shown in any way under the laws of Canada to be relatives. That is quite the reading, because it is very clear in section 3, and the definitions of family and relatives, that they are relatives.

Why does that matter? Because under section 5 of the Conflict of Interest Act, it is up to the Prime Minister to keep his personal life in order so that he is not put into a conflict of interest.

I invite my colleagues to read the Trudeau 1 report. It was the family members' relations with the Aga Khan, not the Prime Minister's, that resulted in the Prime Minister being found guilty. The Prime Minister's familial connections to WE are very important.

Does this mean the Prime Minister knew what the family was making? I do not think so. I do not think we can make that leap, but what we could say is there is a very strong prima facie case that, once the Prime Minister became the Prime Minister of this nation, the WE group was extremely adept at insinuating itself within the Liberal ranks by hiring the mother and hiring the brother. The Kielburgers told us they were not being paid to do public speaking: they were being paid to do corporate events, which they call ancillary events. That is a serious issue, in the same way as the Kielburger group insinuated itself by inviting all kinds of key Liberal cabinet ministers to participate, and when the WE group was in trouble it called those same people who had spoken at its WE events and got the all-access pass.

Having said that, we know Margaret Trudeau and Sacha Trudeau were paid. To me, that is not the hill to die on. The government has released a whole bunch of documents about the payments already. We have that. Whether they got paid 27 times or 28 times is not relevant to me. What is relevant is the issue of lobbying, so let us put that aside. We said that at ethics. We were more than willing to say at ethics not to deal with the family, but with the Prime Minister. Then the Liberals talked the clock out, so I really do not know what their strategy is half the time, because we could have gotten this motion through.

The issue of documents is really important. My colleagues in the Conservatives are demanding documents and saying they do not have enough documents. We have 5,000 pages of documents. Our friend from Carleton came in, threw them all over the room and walked out. Five thousand pages of documents was so much that the Conservatives set up a website and asked the public to do crowdsourced reading of the documents for them.

How serious are the Conservatives? Either we are going to read these documents and take them seriously or we are not.

While the Conservatives threw the documents all over and stomped out and then asked for public help reading the documents, we sat down and read the documents. Those documents raised very serious questions, because they clearly contradicted the government line, where it threw the civil service under the bus time and time again. It is still throwing the civil service under the bus. It is trying to claim that it was the idea of the civil service: the non-partisan, professional civil service. The Minister of Youth said 23 times, in one hour at hearing, that the professional, non-partisan civil service came up with the WE idea. The Liberals said it was the professional, non-partisan civil service that blacked out these documents. That is not true. This was done in the PMO.

What do the documents show us? They show that it was not the civil service that came forward with this idea. This happened at an April 17 meeting with the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth, the Kielburgers and WE's director of government relations, Ms. Sofia Marquez.

WE is not registered to lobby, but it has a director of government relations. In fact, it had more meetings with government officials than General Motors did. That is pretty wild for two guys who present themselves as young idealists from Thornhill. They were so busy with government relations that, on top of their director of government relations, they were going to hire a manager for government relations, and none of that was registered under the Lobbying Act.

Why is that important? It is because the Lobbying Act allows us to see the key meetings that are being held. It allows us to see where the insiders are moving, but the Kielburger group were such total insiders that they did not bother to register to lobby, because they had the key ministers on speed dial.

They had the Minister for Diversity and Youth, who they had invited to come to one of their WE events, where she got to speak and was treated like royalty. When they were in financial free fall, they called her and had a special meeting on April 17. My Conservative colleague asked the minister at the finance committee, at our very first meeting on the WE scandal, if she had taken any meetings with anyone from WE prior to the decision by the government. She said that she never discussed the youth engagement proposal with anyone from WE. Naively, we thought she was telling the truth. We found out four days later she had held the April 17 meeting, so we brought her to the ethics committee and tried to get a straight answer. She said again that she never discussed the youth engagement proposal. That is because on April 17 the youth engagement proposal did not exist. It did not exist until April 22.

She said that she never talked about any of the issues around it, but that is not what we got from the documents from Craig Kielburger. That is not what we got from Sofia Marquez. Craig Kielburger wrote to the minister and said, “We appreciate your thoughtful offer to connect us with the relevant members of your ministry.... Over the weekend, our team has also been hard at work to adapt your suggestions for a second stream focused on a summer service opportunity.” That minister still has her seat at cabinet after the misrepresentation she made.

On the morning of April 19, two days after that meeting, Rachel Wernick, the civil servant we have been told came up with this idea and who has been blamed again and again by the Liberals, emailed Craig Kielburger for an urgent meeting because she had been told that this was the direction to go.

On April 20, senior policy officials in Bill Morneau's office were involved. There is a man who had one of the most powerful positions in the country. He never bothered to read the Conflict of Interest Act, and he wonders why he does not have a job today. I asked him if he had read the Conflict of Interest Act, as he had been found guilty, and he shrugged and said he was given a lot of documents. It is the failure of the Liberals to take the issue of conflict seriously that has gotten them into trouble.

We are here today as the Liberals have taken yet another step to avoid accountability. We have offered to work with them and have offered to lay out a committee, but this work will continue. This work will get done. If they obstruct us here, we will continue at the committees that we can control and in which we can use our leverage, because Canadians need an answer. What Canadians need, in terms of an answer, is better than the threat of the government to force an election for the Prime Minister to escape taking accountability.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that it is fairly well established that the public service made the recommendation to go with WE. The member has made a very specific allegation that the PMO, not a public civil servant, actually made the recommendation.

I am wondering if he would do us the favour of indicating to the House who in the PMO he actually believes gave the recommendation.

Does he have a name, or is it purely speculative?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, if my colleagues were not so afraid to hold committee meetings, they would get those answers. Being that the Liberals are not letting us sit, we are not getting to it.

I would go back to the minister that identified it, who set up those two meetings, who then set up the meetings with diversity, who set up the meetings with finance, who drove this all. Rachel Wernick, in one of the emails, said that at the end the decision is political, and if the minister was good with it, they were good with it.

My hon. colleague is standing up yet again to try to throw our civil service under the bus, over a scheme that would have diverted $900 million to people who hired the Prime Minister's family, to a group that did election-style ads for the Prime Minister, that did not bother to register for lobbying, yet they got government contract after government contract.

If the member bothered to read any of the documents or bothered to have his people show up rather than block committee, he would know that we are getting close to the answers. I think that is why the Liberals are threatening an election now. It is because they know that this is coming back, again and again.

Finally, in the 5,000 pages of documents, there is not a single person who says, “Whoa, they have pictures of Margaret and Sacha in the promotion of the deal.” They were using the Prime Minister's family to get this $900-million contract, and nobody at cabinet thought it was a problem.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Madam Speaker, my colleague and I have been here for a very long time, well over 10 years. It is 15 years for me and I am assuming it is a little north of that—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

It is 29.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

There we go. He was here somewhat before me. In that time, we have had some great exchanges in the House, and in that time, my colleague has actually earned himself the reputation of being a fighter of corruption, of being somebody who would stand up for the little people, somebody who would get to the bottom of issues.

He is the critic for ethics for his political party, and he would have been asked by his leadership team for advice on how the NDP would respond to this motion today.

What did the member tell his leader, what did his leader say back to him and what is the NDP going to do when it comes time to vote on the motion?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have great respect for my colleague. I always get really nervous when the Conservatives tell me how much they like me. I sort of feel like it is being invited to go down and have a picnic by the riverbank with the crocodiles, who are saying, “Come on down and sit with us. We have always thought you were a really decent guy.” I have been there and done that, and I wear the scars.

I would tell my friend that there are three offers on the table. One of those offers is coming from us. We are going to see what the Liberals do. Right now, they are taking a dive. Stay tuned. If the Liberals are willing to work and get a committee, we are going to get that committee one way or another.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Madam Speaker, one of the arguments made by the Liberals in response to this motion is that this is not the time to look into corruption because of the current pandemic. The government can cite the pandemic as the reason for the blockages at the border, immigration, Service Canada or the Canada Revenue Agency and so forth, but it is completely absurd to say that it is not the time to look into corruption because of the pandemic. Furthermore, the government has only itself to blame for getting embroiled in the WE Charity scandal.

I would like to know if my colleague agrees with me that it is time for the opposition to close ranks and that the proposal to create a special committee to study the issue and let the other committees do their usual work is a good solution.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is amazing. We come to committee, we sit there and the Liberals tell us how it is terrible we cannot get to work, but then they will not let us work. They are doing the same now. The Liberals are threatening an actual election over our need to get work done.

The reason this thing matters is that we are spending an unprecedented amount of money, and we will need to spend that money to get people through this. We have to be able to say to the Canadian people that this money was spent to help Canadians, to help students and small businesses, not to help friends of the Liberal Party.

I am very surprised my hon. colleagues in the Conservative Party did not mention David MacNaughton as part of the study. David MacNaughton was found guilty. Here is a top Liberal insider trying to bring Palantir, one of the creepiest companies on the planet, a massive data surveillance company, run by the extreme right. Oh, maybe that is why they did not want to deal with it, because Peter Thiel is an extreme right-wing guy. He got invited right into the deputy prime minister's office, though, because he was a Liberal.

We need to know decisions about the pandemic are not being done to help Liberal insiders. That is why this work must get done.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Madam Speaker, the member for Timmins—James Bay will know, as a colleague of mine, that I have worked in the international development sector for over 20 years prior to being elected to the House. I have worked with the WE Charity, and I find it one of the most disgusting organizations I have worked with. It is the absolute opposite of a good organization for international development or global citizenship.

While I was appalled to hear the Liberal government was working with the WE Charity, I am actually most appalled about where that $912 million went that was supposed to support students. I have the University of Alberta and many post-secondary institutions in my riding and that money evaporated.

I would ask my esteemed colleague what the students and recent graduates in my riding are supposed to do now. Where did the $912 million go? Where is the support for students?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, yes, my colleague has had a great deal of experience in the international community and there are many disturbing issues being raised. I know that an international group of charities and NGOs released a statement today about their questions regarding WE's involvement in Kenya. That is very troubling. I do not know if it is necessarily the role of Parliament to carry out that investigation. Ours is how the Liberals were going to give this money.

On the second part of my colleague's question, we have an unprecedented crisis facing university students, with their massive levels of debt and the uncertainty of universities reopening. The Prime Minister made that promise on April 8, by April 17 the Kielburgers were in meetings and by April 22, when it was announced, it was the WE plan. Once WE did not get what it wanted and the Prime Minister's group was not able to transfer that money, that money evaporated.

I am telling the Liberals to show some good faith and put that money back in. Tuition could be deferred this winter. What a message that would send to the young generation that is taking on so much debt at a time of uncertainty if the government were to invest in education, like the University of Alberta and Laurentian University in Sudbury. Students would actually be able to carry on with their studies. However, we are not hearing that from the government. We are hearing the government threaten to cause an election in order to evade the consequences of its actions.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion and Youth and to the Minister of Canadian Heritage (Sport)]

Madam Speaker, I have great admiration for the work that my colleagues across the floor have done in international development. I have done some myself as a former athlete ambassador for various organizations. I also have great admiration and respect for the member for Timmins—James Bay.

I just heard a really good idea: that we investigate how we can help students. With all of the things going on right now in Canada, whether it is everything going on in Nova Scotia with the Mi'kmaq and the lobster fisheries or other various first nations issues, I would ask if we should not be focused on ways to help Canadians and whether forming this committee and discussing these issues would help Canadians or if we should focus on some solutions for Canadians, young, old, everyone.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is that come to Jesus moment, where the Liberals ask if we can just help Canadians. Yes, we can help Canadians. What have we been doing in this House? He is saying let us help Canadians. The best way we help Canadians is to set this committee up so the other committees can do their work, and have the Prime Minister stop threatening an election.

If my colleague said, how about the government helps Canadians, promises not to threaten an election and actually shows that it cares about indigenous people, then, yes, let us do that. If it actually cares about students, it should transfer that $900 million—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Liberal, Alexandra Mendes]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Red Deer—Lacombe.

We find ourselves here today addressing a persistent problem with these Liberals. I was elected in 2018 and my first committee assignment was on the justice committee. The expectation was that, with the agenda set for the spring session prior to an election, it would be a good opportunity for me to learn about how committees operate.

What we saw 10 days later was a story in The Globe and Mail that detailed how the Prime Minister, the Liberal Prime Minister, had interfered in the criminal prosecution of his friends at SNC-Lavalin. This of course led to a real lesson on how Liberals operate at committee and what the Liberals do with their majority at committee. We saw this. They would send in members to shut the committee down. Look, they fired their attorney general.

We heard that because it was 2015 things were going to be done differently. Canada had a female indigenous attorney general. She stood up, spoke truth to power and the Prime Minister kicked her out of caucus. We had Dr. Jane Philpott as Treasury Board president, who stood up and spoke truth to power. She saw that what was happening was wrong. What happened? He kicked her out of cabinet and kicked her out of caucus.

Accountability is not the strong suit of the government, to say the least, and we saw that. Before I was elected, we saw in “The Trudeau Report” that the Prime Minister did not understand ethics laws. That is what we were led to believe. It was the first mistake. The second time was the “Trudeau II Report”, the second wave, if we will, of ethical law breaking by these Liberals.

We arrive in a pandemic after my second election, not even two years after I was first elected, and parliamentarians worked together to get results for Canadians in challenging times. We hear it over and over again that these are unprecedented times. It was very interesting to observe that. I have heard from veteran members that it was very unique to see that type of collaboration.

One of the first things the government did was try an unprecedented power grab. It wanted the ability to tax and spend without parliamentary oversight until December of 2021. That was the Liberals' goodwill. That was their working together. It was their team Canada approach. It is staggering the arrogance these Liberals demonstrated.

During the summer, we learned an organization that had paid half a million dollars to members of the Trudeau family was given a half-billion dollar contract to administer, by the Prime Minister, whose family members had benefited from that relationship. This is during the same summer we had the Prime Minister's chief of staff with questionable connections in the awarding of the emergency commercial rent assistance program. We had the awarding of a contract to build ventilators, ventilators that had no regulatory approval, but the manufacturer, the person who owned the company, was in the caucus room with these Liberals last year. It was a former Liberal MP.

Parliamentarians started to look at the awarding of this half-billion dollar contract. To be fair, originally it was announced that it was $912 million. However, what happened seemed like a bit of scattershot because, as we learned in the investigation that followed, the Prime Minister was announcing programs that had just been put on his desk and the details had not been completely worked out. That was on April 22, but on April 21, the program had been written. Who wrote it? It was the WE organization that wrote it.

We will hear that it could only be administered by the WE organization. However, it could only be administered by it because it wrote it. The organization wrote a proposal that only it could complete.

When the proposal went to cabinet, what was included? Ultimately, it did need to be approved by the cabinet. It was accountable and responsible for the decision. Those decision-makers made their decision, complete with a picture book, and the picture book contained pictures of the Prime Minister's family. That was the compelling argument. It was not based on the organization's merits; it was based on who it knew. This is what we are seeing with the programs that are being awarded. It is the connections between these individuals and people in the halls of power. With the Liberals, it is not what they know, it is who they know.

Then questions started getting too intense and documents were ordered. On the eve of the release of these documents, the Prime Minister prorogued Parliament. It was a cover-up prorogation. The Prime Minister said, “When Parliament resumes in the fall there will be ample opportunities to continue to ask whatever questions committees or members want to continue to do.”

We were led to believe it was not a cover-up. He said that we could ask any questions, that committees could do their work. Now we are back and the Liberals have taken every opportunity to filibuster those committees, and not just the ones asking about the scandals. They are filibustering the health committee, which is asking questions specifically about COVID-related measures. To be fair, these issues and scandals arose out of an abuse of power when we had these contracts being awarded to Liberal insiders.

Back in August, the Prime Minister said that we could ask whatever questions we wanted. We are in October now and what is he saying? He is saying that if we ask questions about corruption in the Prime Minister's Office or around the cabinet table, members will be met with filibusters. If the filibusters do not wear the opposition down, the Liberals will force Canadians into an election. That is their threat, that is their bluff. During the second wave of a pandemic, they will force Canadians into an election.

We are actually into the third wave, which is the third wave of Liberal corruption. We had that first report from the Ethics Commissioner which found the Prime Minister guilty of breaking ethics laws. The second report from the Ethics Commissioner found the Prime Minister guilty of breaking ethics laws. He is now under investigation for a third time.

Committees have ordered these documents. The Liberals will stop at nothing and literally force an election over not releasing these documents. That is very different from the open by default, sunshine is the best disinfectant and sunny ways Prime Minister we heard from just a few years ago.

Where is that open and accountable government document? Contrary to the promises we heard in 2015, it looks like the Liberals no longer believe that better is always possible. The official opposition, Canada's Conservatives, in concert with the other opposition parties of conscience will stand against Liberal corruption and will not collude with the government. None of us are calling for an election, and it says so in the motion. If discomfort is the ground the Liberals want to use to force an election, that is on their conscience.

We will vote our conscience. We will stand for what is right, we will stand for an accountable government and the Liberals can tell stories about years past and prime ministers long ago. I look forward to hearing about the sponsorship scandal and the Parliamentary Secretary to the government House leader's stance. We will get answers for Canadians. That is exactly what we promised to do.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, let us be very clear. For five years the sole purpose of the Conservative Party has been to attack Liberal cabinet ministers. The Conservatives have spared no cost and time of the House. They have done endless filibusters and have used privileges and adjourn motions. There are so many to name, and nothing has changed.

Even during a pandemic, when the priority of Canadians has been the health and well being of Canadians as a whole and our economy, the Conservatives are still focused on the same issue they were focused on five years ago. Nothing has changed. It is as if Stephen Harper is still their leader.

Does the member not agree that Canadians deserve an opposition that does more than one thing?

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Madam Speaker, the same question could be put to the member opposite. We get one thing from those Liberals. We will stop asking questions about corruption if the Liberals stop breaking the law. We have had multiple findings of ethical law-breaking by the front bench of the Liberals time and time again: forgotten French villas, clam scam, billionaire island. It is unbelievable the litany of scandals from the Liberals.

However, we can walk and chew gum at the same time. We can hold the Liberals to account for their ethical law-breaking and also deliver results for Canadians, and we will keep doing that.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, this Liberal government is sending us all kinds of mixed messages through the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons.

First, he tells us that we cannot do our job as members of Parliament to question the government and hold it accountable, because we need to focus on the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the pandemic is just an excuse to justify a string of conflicts of interest of epidemic proportions.

The government does not seem to be able to do more than one thing. The amendment the Conservatives proposed today was proposed in the spirit of collaboration referenced by the parliamentary secretary. This amendment would remove the contentious term of “anti-corruption” and instead talk about a special committee on allegations of misuse of public funds by the government.

What does my Conservative colleague think the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons has a problem with? He is completely against us doing our jobs here in the House and holding the executive to account.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is tough to say why the member for Winnipeg North persists that the only way to do things in the House is the Liberals' way. The government forgets that Canadians shortened its leash in 2019. They took away the Liberal majority for many of the issues I have highlighted today. Every time the Liberals do not get their way, they move closure, or they want unanimous consent or they need it done now, and no consultations. They write the throne speech and then call the opposition leaders for input. It is supreme arrogance, and this is a classic example of it.

It is time to remind the government that it does not have that majority anymore. Opposition parties are going to hold it to account. It is what Canadians expect.

[Leah Gazan, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Madam Speaker, the people who are suffering the most during the WE scandal are students, and that is abhorrent. It is a real slap in the face to students who are struggling.

Like the Liberal government, when the Conservatives were in power, they found themselves with many issues of conflict, for example, refusal to share budget information. The former Harper government refused to share their reasons for cuts and the impact of those cuts with Canada's independent budget officer, 170 times. They were found falsifying documents and reports about a former minister, Bev Oda. The list goes on and on. Liberals, Tories, same—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Liberal, Alexandra Mendes]

I have to give the member for Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes the chance to answer.

A very brief answer please.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member for Winnipeg Centre offered a very important example of contrast.

Members will recall the minister who the member referenced. I believe there was a massive scandal over a $16 glass of orange juice. What happened? We do not see that member here anymore. I believe the prime minister at the time took some pretty decisive action. Now we have a situation, not about a $16 glass of orange juice but about a half a billion dollar contract given to an organization that paid the Prime Minister's family half a million dollars. Let us talk about contrast.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Madam Speaker, what a pleasure it is to be back in the House for regular sittings. It is the first time since, I believe, March 12, so I am glad to be back here speaking on behalf of my constituents in central Alberta and the riding of Red Deer—Lacombe.

I want to thank my colleague who just spoke for the excellent work he is doing in holding the Liberal government to account. He has a very busy job as the ethics critic for the Liberal government, which means he is the busiest man in Canada. I want to thank him very much for the fine work he is doing. I know my colleagues will join me in showing him some appreciation.

My constituents are very frustrated on a number of fronts. They are frustrated with the Liberal government's policy on energy. My riding is much like that of Sarnia, Ontario. There is a large petrochemical installation in my riding. It was one of the last holdouts of good paying jobs in central Alberta, which is now under attack by the Liberal government. Those jobs now seem to be in jeopardy.

More important, my constituents are frustrated with the amount of unaccountable spending by the government. Billions of dollars have been rushed out the door. I cannot remember the last time the House sat and passed an actual budget.

These are unprecedented times. We all know, going back in the history books to 1995 and the previous Liberal government of Jean Chrétien, that when money is being spent in a big rush under the guise of an urgent matter, such as the sponsorship scandal then, the Liberals cannot not help themselves when it came to lining their own pockets. The amount of money back then pales in comparison to the amount of money being spent today.

One only has to look at the reason for this motion today to have an anti-corruption committee because of the amount of money that has gone out, with virtually no accountability. First, we needed to shut down the House because of the pandemic. Now the Liberals are keeping Canadians and Parliamentarians in the dark, not because it suits the health care interests of the country but because it suits their design of holding onto power desperately, so desperately, in fact, that they are willing to cause an election that nobody actually wants. They are willing to throw down that gauntlet, force an election on the Canadian public during a pandemic just to cover up the fact that they do not want to talk anymore or have anymore information uncovered about this WE scandal.

Why is this important? It is important on a number of fronts. One is that we need to have trust and confidence in our institutions. The primary institution that Canadians need to have trust in is Parliament. If parliamentarians are not able to do their jobs, if we are not able to get the information we need at committee, if we are not able to have the correct information to make decisions and recommendations, then we are not able to do our jobs. We need that confidence and ability to get that information.

What have we seen so far? My colleague who just spoke said that we were in the third wave of Liberal corruption. I would suggest that we are in a wave pool. The waves just keep coming. The first one was cash for access, which was a very big deal. If people wanted to have influence with the government, all they had to do was go to a fundraiser. If it was a foreign government, all it had to do was to put a whole bunch of money into a foundation that happened to share the same last name as the Prime Minister and it could get what it wanted, so much so that the government had to change the rules. Because the Prime Minister was unable to follow his own rules, we had to change them so political entities could continue to do their business without the issue of cash for access or the perception of being able to buy one's way into the Liberal government's inner circle.

That was one of the first major issues the government had.

Then we had the trip to billionaire island, friends of the family. I remember that very well as the former chair of the ethics committee at the time. It was epic.

Four times, under four different counts, the Prime Minister is the very first prime minister in Canadian history to be charged under ethics laws.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Harper brought it in.