Charlie Angus

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 6th, 2012]

Come on, Mr. Speaker. This is a question of fairness. It is not like we are asking them to take public transit.

Let us look at what they spent at Davos. The Muskoka minister racked up $8,000 on a limo that sat idle. We are not asking him to hitchhike. We are not asking him to turn back the gazebo. I will give him the receipts if he did not look at them.

My question is simple. Why are they not showing the same care for taxpayers dollars, the hard-working Canadians who sent them to Davos so they could hang around in limos looking good?

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 6th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, let us talk about what they were talking about in Davos among the millionaires in Europe. They were saying that Canada was so poor that they were going to squeeze back the pensions of Canadian seniors. That is where they made that announcement. They did not tell Canadian seniors. They told the European millionaires.

Yesterday, the member told the House that they had to spend $23,000 on limos because it was about looking good. Is this standard established by the Durham minister now that they need to look good when they travel in Europe?

Why are they so interested in looking good in front of European millionaires instead of being accountable to Canadian taxpayers and to Canadian seniors?

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 5th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, obviously we have touched a nerve here, because the Minister of Finance, the Muskoka minister, and the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, the three musketeers, have the nerve to preach austerity while whooping it up like royalty off the taxpayers.

Will one of those men do the right thing? Will this member do the right thing? Will they stand up and pay the money back?

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 5th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I did not expect an apology, because the ministers seem to think that should be entitled to act like the Habsburg dynasty as soon as they leave Canada.

This is the latest issue of lack of accountability. When we have the President of the Treasury Board, the Minister of Finance and the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, who have—

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 5th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, now we know why the House leader is so bullish on defending the minister of luxurious living: it is because he shares her same sense of entitlement.

We learned that the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, the Minister of Finance and the President of the Treasury Board racked up $23,000 for two days of joyriding in Davos. This sense of privilege is unconscionable when they have the nerve to tell Canadians that the cupboard is bare.

Enough of treating taxpayers like chumps. Will the minister pay the money back?

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 4th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, Lordy, Lordy, ask a simple little question about accountability and he starts dancing like the very devil in holy water.

When did it become okay to alter documents? When did it become okay for ministers to charge $5,000 for limos? And when did it become okay to mislead Parliament? We are talking about the latest round of public abuse.

The Conservatives obviously support everything she has done. My question is, if they are not going to fire her, will they bring in a third party audit so that we can find out why they continually change the travel claims of that luxurious minister? It is a simple question.

[Ministerial Expenditures, June 4th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, yet once again the Minister of International Cooperation has been caught altering her travel expenses. This is a pattern of obstruction and interference that dates back to 2006. If she were in the private sector, they would have given her a pink slip long ago, but the Prime Minister gives her the thumbs up.

Thankfully, the member for New Brunswick Southwest has had the courage to speak out against his party's contempt for the taxpayers.

I ask a simple question today. Is there anybody over there on the government benches, anybody else, who is offended by her misuse of taxpayer dollars? Is there anybody who will stand up for accountability? Just one, please?

[Ethics, May 31st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, a couple of weeks ago, a $3,000 limo ride in London was perfectly appropriate, and then the government got caught. He did not answer the question, which was why the minister was changing her travel claims again.

This is not just about the minister who has become a serial offender of the public trust; this is about the Prime Minister who promised Canadians that he would clean up Ottawa. Instead, he has allowed the minister to misrepresent spending, he has allowed her to hide the paper trail and he has allowed her to mislead Parliament. It is a question of why the Prime Minister decides there is one set of rules for him and his buddies and another set of rules for everyone else.

Why is there no accountability when it comes to that minister?

[Ethics, May 31st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, if someone in the private sector repeatedly covered up their documents and misrepresented their spending, they would get fired or their employer would call the cops.

However, when it is the Minister of International Cooperation who does it, she becomes just another Teflon Tory. She was caught hiding outrageous limo expenses. She has been caught and had to pay back for her rock star trip to London. Now we find she has been changing the travel claims for her latest round of trips.

Canadians play by the rules, but the government seems to think it is above them. Here is a simple question: what is the minister trying to hide this time?

[Ethics, May 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, if the Conservatives were really interested in accountability, they would not be stuffing these boards with failed Tory candidates. They have the nerve to tell average Canadians that the cupboard is bare while creating the most audacious employment scheme for people who were deliberately rejected by the people of Canada. We have failed Tories at the Employment Insurance Board, the Parole Board, the Human Rights Tribunal, the port authorities and, of course, the cash-for-life senator. My God, it is like watching a proliferation of zombies in a Tory horror movie. Why are they using the same tired old pork-barrel, rum-bottle politics that Canadians rejected when they threw out the Liberals?