Madam Speaker, they can heckle me all they want; it is fine. We are not going to be quiet on this side of the House, because we want the truth to come out. Government members can try to heckle and try to delay. They can do whatever they want. We will always fight for the taxpayer.
In the new scandal we are talking about today, 400 million of Canadian taxpayers' hard-earned dollars have been misappropriated. The Auditor General, who is the independent body who oversees and demands accountability for these contracts, found 186 conflicts of interest.
There were people making decisions on contracts for their own benefit. One person would go out of the room, the vote would happen, the board would vote in favour and that person would come back and sit back down. The next person would get up and leave the room, the vote would happen and that person would get the contract and sit back down. That is not how we do business. That is corruption.
A lot of whistle-blowers came forward and shared their concerns. There was violation after violation and they still keep rolling out.
We have asked for these documents to be presented, unredacted, so we can get to the bottom of this scandal. The Speaker ruled on this. We all want the truth, but again, Liberals are not releasing the documents. It begs the question: What are they trying to hide? Who are they trying to protect? This $400 million is not a small amount of change.
We have seen Liberals paralyze Parliament because of the corruption and their cover-up. It is sometimes said that the crime is bad but the cover-up is even worse. We are seeing attempts every single day to cover this up. The money the Liberals have wasted on this scandal and every other scandal I listed earlier today is taxpayer money, which was not given to us easily.
When I am in my riding, I hear from that single mother who is working double shifts and feels she is being taxed to death, but who sometimes believes the money that goes to the government might help her one day. She makes the sacrifice of being away from her family. I hear from that senior on a fixed income, on a fixed pension, who is getting clocked taxes.
I also hear from that owner of the mom-and-pop shop who has taken a massive line of credit, who took the risk of starting a business. The people who put all their life savings into these businesses are paying more taxes. When the Liberal government is taxing Canadians to death, each dollar means something. People are paying their taxes with their blood, sweat and tears. That money comes to the government. All people ask is that the money that gets spent helps make their lives better, is not wasted and is not given to the government's friends.
We know how tough life is right now. Two million Canadians are lining up at food banks and one in four are skipping meals. There are seniors who cannot afford medicine anymore. We have seen businesses shutting down, and 60% of Canadians are only $200 away from bankruptcy.
We saw what happened in B.C., where 15,000 people lined up just to get a bag of rotten potatoes, or potatoes not fit for sale. People are struggling. Every dollar that goes out of their pockets makes it tougher for them to live and raise their families.
Canada had a promise that the Conservative leader spoke about today: If people worked hard in this country, they were able to save some money, buy that dream house and go on a vacation once in a while. However, when the government is taxing people to death and then recklessly spending hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers' hard-earned money on itself, that is a problem. While Canadians line up at food banks, the government is lining the pockets of Liberal insiders. That is something quite concerning to all of us.
Conservatives take this very seriously because we hear this story every single day. When my colleagues and I are door knocking, when we are at events or meet-and-greets, this is a number one concern. Constituents say the government keeps taking more and more, and it keeps spending it recklessly.
Tax dollars come to the government, and what do the Liberals do? Line their own pockets. We have to keep reminding them this is not something that will go away; it is something we will keep fighting for. It is a scandal we are not going to let go away until the government brings these documents to the committee, has the RCMP investigate this and has some transparency and openness.
On this side of the House, we take this job very seriously. Seeing the Liberals not comply with the Speaker's ruling sends a very strong message that they are hiding something and that the problem is a lot bigger than what we may even know. On the Conservative side, we are going to keep fighting the good fight. We are going to get to the bottom of this scandal and we are not going to stop; we are relentless.
We are not going to stop fighting for Canadian taxpayers. We are going to make sure the documents come out, and we want this to stop paralyzing Parliament. We want to go back to our core values and our core message to fight for Canadians: We will axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime.
We are not going to let the government continue to steal money from Canadians. It is not going to happen, at least not under our watch. Our ask to the Liberals, again and again, is to please release the documents, unredacted. This could all stop if they give us the documents. This will stop when they pay back the money that Canadians are owed. It is not their money; it is the Canadian taxpayers' money.