Madam Speaker, it is another day and another Liberal scandal. Canadians have watched Parliament grind to a halt because of the government's green slush fund scandal, and now that the Liberals have been caught, the Prime Minister is preventing Parliament from moving forward in order to cover up the truth. Members of the House fully understand that Parliament has ground to a halt because the Prime Minister is refusing to hand over documents relating to Sustainable Development Technology Canada.
Sustainable Development Technology Canada, also known as SDTC, was created by the government to fund new technologies that would reduce emissions. However, Canadians have discovered that SDTC has turned into nothing more than a Liberal slush fund rampant with corruption and conflicts of interest. Ever since the Liberals began appointing new executives to the board in 2019, executives were awarding money to companies that they held an active conflict of interest in.
The Liberals would have gotten away with this corruption had it not been for the brave whistle-blowers who came forward to sound the alarm on the financial mismanagement of the fund. Since then, both the Auditor General and the Ethics Commissioner launched separate investigations into the Liberal green slush fund. What did they find? The Auditor General's investigation revealed that $390 million in funding was awarded to projects that should have been totally ineligible or was awarded to projects in which the board members were conflicted. The Auditor General found SDTC awarded $58 million to 10 ineligible projects that at times could not prove an environmental benefit or a development of green technology, $334 million over 186 cases in which board members held a conflict of interest and $58 million for projects without guaranteeing that terms and conditions were met. Liberal insiders were caught padding the pockets of companies that they were invested in, and they were doing this all with Canadian taxpayers' money.
Although the Auditor General exposed this corruption, there are many reasons to believe that this is far more than just financial mismanagement. Canadians are asking if this is criminal, and rightly so.
The same whistle-blower who exposed the Liberals' green slush fund is confident that an RCMP investigation would find criminality. The whistle-blower stated at committee, “Just as I was always confident that the Auditor General would confirm the financial mismanagement at SDTC, I remain equally confident that the RCMP will substantiate the criminal activities that occurred within the organization.” When asked if the Auditor General's investigation was sufficient enough, the whistle-blower said:
I think the Auditor General's investigation was more of a cursory review. I don't think the goal and mandate of the Auditor General's office is to actually look into criminality, so I'm not surprised by the fact that they haven't found anything criminal. They're not looking at intent. If their investigation was focused on intent, of course they would find the criminality.
That is why the House of Commons ordered that the documents on the green slush fund be handed over to the RCMP. How will we ever get to the bottom of this corruption if the RCMP does not have all the information needed to fully investigate the criminality of the slush fund?
Although the Liberals voted against the document production order, the House of Commons adopted the motion. However, instead of respecting the will of Parliament, the Liberal government refused to release the documents ordered by the House of Commons and therefore breached the privileges of Parliament. This is a very serious offence. How can we represent Canadians if the Prime Minister fails to respect the House of Commons? How can we represent Canadians if the Prime Minister disregards the powers of Parliament? How can we represent Canadians if the Prime Minister turns a blind eye to democracy? The answer is simple: We cannot.
What we are seeing from the Prime Minister is a full-scale cover-up to hide the massive corruption. The Prime Minister does not care about accountability. He does not care about transparency. He does not care about justice. The only thing the Prime Minister cares about is protecting his government and the Liberal insiders who got rich from taxpayer dollars.
It is not just me who is saying this either. While testifying at the committee, the SDTC whistle-blower stated, “I think the current government is more interested in protecting themselves and protecting the situation from being a public nightmare. They would rather protect wrongdoers and financial mismanagement than have to deal with a situation like SDTC in the public sphere.” I could not agree more. It has become very clear over the last nine years that the Canadians who do best under the government are well-connected Liberal insiders.
The Liberal government has displayed a constant disregard for Parliament and the work of parliamentarians. This is not the first time the Liberals have failed to adhere to document production orders, especially regarding their failed environmental programs. For months, the environment committee ordered the environment minister to release proof that the carbon tax reduces emissions. In fact, the committee ordered the production of these documents on three separate occasions. We ordered this information on November 30, 2023, on March 21, 2020, and again on April 9, 2024.
Each time the committee ordered these documents, the environment minister disregarded the will of parliamentarians and refused to provide them. I wonder why. Maybe it was because the environment minister admitted that his government does not track the emissions directly reduced from the carbon tax. Maybe it was because emissions have gone up under the Prime Minister. Maybe it was because Canada's independent environment commissioner said that the Liberals would not meet their own emissions reduction targets. The point is that the environment minister's defiance of Parliament was an insult to Canadians. Unfortunately, the NDP and the Bloc refused to refer this matter to the House of Commons at the time.
With regard to the carbon tax, it is important to note that just this morning, the independent Parliamentary Budget Officer once again confirmed that the carbon tax will cost the average Canadian family more than they get back. According to the PBO's report, which was just released this morning, “taking into consideration both fiscal and economic impacts, PBO estimates that the average household in each of the backstop provinces will see a net cost”. It it no wonder the Liberals were hiding the carbon tax documents from the environment committee.
This was not the only time this year that the Liberals refused to hand over documents on their failed environmental programs. Although we are discussing a billion-dollar green slush fund today, I am confident that we will soon be discussing another one very soon in the House of Commons. That is because earlier this year, the environment commissioner released a damning report on the Liberal government's $8-billion net-zero accelerator fund. The vast majority of Canadians have never heard of the net-zero accelerator fund, which I find very surprising given that it is costing taxpayers $8 billion.
Usually when a government spends this much money, its members travel across the country, talk about what the money was used for and how it will help Canadians. However, that is not the case with the net-zero accelerator fund. Thanks to Canada's environment commissioner, we now know why the Liberals do not want to talk about it. In a damning report tabled in Parliament, Canada's environment commissioner revealed that the $8-billion net-zero accelerator was nothing more than another Liberal slush fund. The audit found that over 70% of the funding agreements had no commitment to reduce any emissions. The whole point of this fund was to reduce emissions, but now we know that this was a complete lie. Does this sound familiar? It sure does. This is very similar to the corruption we are debating today on the Liberals' billion-dollar green slush fund.
Canada's Auditor General found that 10 projects funded through the green slush fund did not even produce green technology or contribute to emissions reductions. In fact, $59 million of the green slush fund was spent on ineligible projects. This is the same type of corruption that was revealed by the environment commissioner on the Liberals' net-zero accelerator fund.
The commissioner testified at committee on this scandal. He stated that “the department did not always know to what extent GHG emissions had been reduced by those companies that took part in the initiative, or whether the funding provided would lead to reduced emissions.”
When I asked the commissioner how many emissions had been reduced by this $8-billion emissions reduction program, he stated, “I can't say how many yet.”
It is unbelievable. When I asked the commissioner if the government was tracking the value for money from the net-zero accelerator, he replied, “Not in a public way.... We've made our own calculations of the value for money that we could, based on the data they have, but we have seen no public reporting on the value for money, no.”
Not only did the environment commissioner reveal that the Liberals were handing out money without any commitment to reduce emissions, but the commissioner also revealed that the emissions reduction target of net-zero accelerator was being protected under cabinet confidence.
According to a written response from the government's industry department, the government is “not in a position to disclose the [emissions reduction] targets, as they are protected under Cabinet confidence”. This is coming from the same department that was responsible for the green slush fund that we are debating today.
The Liberals are charging taxpayers $8 billion for a government program that is supposed to reduce emissions without telling them the goal of the program. That means no one will ever know what the money is achieving, if anything.
Who got the money? In typical Liberal fashion, the government was keeping this list a secret from Canadians. The lucky recipients of $8 billion in taxpayers' money could not be found anywhere.
That is why Conservatives on the environment committee ordered the government to release this list of recipients. We found that billions of taxpayer dollars were given away to non-Canadian companies.
The Liberals refused to provide this list to Canadian taxpayers, so I will read the recipients of the money into the record: $200 million to Algoma Steel, $400 million to ArcelorMittal, $49 million to Heidelberg Materials, $514 million to Stellantis, $96 million to General Motors, $40 million to CAE, $61 million to Pratt & Whitney, $222 million to Rio Tinto, $15 million to Volvo, $350 million to INSAT, $300 million to Air Products, $27 million to E3 Lithium, $15 million to AVL Fuel Cell Canada, $204 million to E-One Moli, $25 million to Svante, $48 million to Moltex, $500 million to NextStar Energy, $700 million to PowerCo, $551 million to Umicore Canada, $27 million to Westinghouse, $50 million to Lion Electric, $37 million to Vale Canada Limited and $148 million to POSCO.
I doubt the Canadian taxpayers will ever get a thank you from these megacorporations. Taxpayers should be furious. I am furious. I cannot imagine hearing this and knowing that $8 billion went to foreign companies, very well-off companies, in the name of net zero, in the name of “we are going to reduce emissions and we all have to put our shoulder to this”.
What did we get out of this? Someone's pockets were lined, but it certainly was not the Canadian taxpayer.
Canadian taxpayers should be disgusted with the Liberal government as it continues to spend their money without any transparency or accountability. That is why the environment committee ordered that those net-zero accelerator contracts be released, so Canadians could see the details, but the government is once again refusing to respect a documentation order. It has been over 150 days since we ordered these documents on behalf of Canadians, yet the Liberal government refuses to show Canadian taxpayers what it is charging them $8 billion for.
It gets worse. This is unbelievable. Earlier this week, at the government operations and estimates committee, the environment commissioner revealed the Liberals have created a fast-track lane for this $8-billion taxpayer-funded program. According to the environment commissioner, megacorporations can fast-track their applications for billions of taxpayer dollars by simply writing a letter. Guess who that letter is supposed to be sent to: the Prime Minister.
According to page 8 of the environment commissioner's report on the net-zero accelerator fund, “A project of more than $50 million also requires Treasury Board approval, concurrence letters from ministers of other concerned departments, and Cabinet approval”. It then states that net-zero accelerator projects “can be fast-tracked with a letter to the Prime Minister.”
The Liberals are giving special access to billions of tax dollars with a simple letter to the Prime Minister. We cannot make this stuff up. This is absolutely absurd. If Canadians thought the green slush fund was the damning scandal, wait until we uncover the truth about the Liberals' $8-billion net-zero accelerator slush fund.
Parliament has the privilege to compel the production of papers. The privilege allows us to properly represent Canadians who elected us to serve them. However, as the Speaker ruled, the privilege was breached by the Liberal government and the Liberal Prime Minister. Let us not forget that. The Prime Minister is blocking everything. We can all dance around this and we can all say what we want to say, but the Prime Minister is ultimately in control of this, and he does not want to have anybody see these documents.
On June 10, the House of Commons passed a motion that ordered the production of documents relating to the government's green slush fund so they could be turned over to the RCMP. In response to this motion, the government either outright refused the House order or redacted the documents that were turned over, basically making them useless so no one could do a full investigation. It would ultimately end up at committee just like we are right now. That is why Conservatives raised the question of privilege.
The Speaker then ruled on this question of privilege. He stated, “The House has the undoubted right to order the production of any and all documents from any entity or individual it deems necessary to carry out its duties.” The Speaker then added, “The House has clearly ordered the production of certain documents, and that order has clearly not been fully complied with.”
It is no wonder that Canadians have lost confidence in the government. Time and time again, we see the Liberal government cover up its wrongdoings. It is a pattern of behaviour that has resulted in anger among Canadians. Every time the Liberal government is caught doing something wrong, it does everything it can to cover up its wrongdoings. This approach is dangerous to democracy because it suggests the government can get away with anything. It sets a precedent that rules do not apply to the government of the day.
After nine years, this is more proof that the Liberals are not worth the cost, crime or corruption. The Speaker has ruled that the Liberal government has violated Parliament's order to hand over evidence to the police for a criminal investigation into the Liberals' $400-million green slush fund scandal. Instead of respecting the will of Parliament by handing over the documents, the Prime Minister has instead chosen to paralyze Parliament. As such, the Prime Minister has made it impossible for members of Parliament to address the issue that matters most to Canadians. We cannot address the doubling of—
