Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time today with the member for Timmins—James Bay. I would like to thank him for his very important work on this particular issue and for his ongoing effort to get to the truth for Canadians.
I would also like to give a nod to my colleague, the member for Victoria, for his excellent work on the justice file and the incredible level of competence, intelligence and compassion he has brought to this entire affair over the past six weeks. I am quite honoured to be following in his footsteps as the justice critic for the NDP, and as always, I am very proud to stand as the member for Essex.
I rise today to speak to the motion before us that would allow the member for Vancouver Granville to speak her whole truth. Liberals want Canadians to believe that she has already had her opportunity to do this. They keep repeating the line that she has had four hours to have her say and that is good enough for them.
That is not going to get us to the truth. The former attorney general and justice minister has said in this chamber and publicly to the media that she would like the opportunity to come back to committee and would in fact be available at invitation.
We now know that the committee made the unprecedented move yesterday to vote to end the study and to shut down the testimony about allegations into political interference with the former attorney general. That is really the heart of why we are here. I hear my Liberal colleagues making legal arguments about precedent setting and expanding what people can speak about under orders in council, but we are here to talk about political interference. We are not here to talk about the Shawcross doctrine. We are not here to talk about a lot of the things the Liberals are trying to change the channel with. Quite frankly, I think Canadians are getting dizzy from their changing the channel. They are running out of channels, unfortunately.
Once again today, there was a new development. The CEO of SNC-Lavalin blew apart the argument that has been put forward by the Liberals, and in fact by the Prime Minister, that this is all about jobs and the Prime Minister is just trying to protect Canadian jobs. Today, the CEO of SNC-Lavalin stated that he never told the Prime Minister that jobs in Canada were in danger. He never said that. The jobs argument is not based in fact and the Prime Minister is trying to turn that channel to protect the only job that matters to him, which is his own.
When the CEO was asked on BNN Bloomberg about whether he threatened to move SNC headquarters out of Montreal, he said no. A reporter asked where the notion that this was a possibility came from, and the CEO responded, “I don't know what people make up”.
Once again, we are finding bombshell after bombshell come out in this case, where the Liberals do not want to get to the truth. Now we know the jobs argument is completely false. This was not the argument made by SNC-Lavalin at all, and its CEO has been quite public about that.
The Prime Minister needs to answer to Canadians regarding why he has decided to bend the truth and create the false argument about jobs and trying to protect them. This argument is quite ironic given the fact that he turned his back on 12,000 Sears workers, GM Oshawa workers and postal workers. The list of jobs the Prime Minister will not protect or fight for goes on and on.
Let us get back to what happened at the justice committee. I cannot speak to this specifically, of course, because the meeting was in camera, behind closed doors. In an emergency meeting last week, we attempted to have the conversation about inviting the member for Vancouver Granville back to committee. Quite publicly, the Liberals used a crude tool to shut down debate under the guise that they needed time to think about things before coming back to committee. They said they had not had time to speak to each other and that they wanted to look at all of the possibilities.
On the eve of this week's justice committee meeting, which was to be in camera, behind closed doors, Liberals sent a letter, not to the committee members but to the media, saying there is nothing to see here and that they had already made up their minds. They said Canadians could make up their minds based on what they now know and that was enough. Canadians did not need to know any more.
It does not come as a surprise that New Democrats fundamentally disagree with the moves and behaviour of the Liberals on the justice committee.
It was very clear to me in my new role on the justice committee that the Liberal members are more interested in damage control and protecting the Prime Minister than they are in finding the truth. The truth is what Canadians deserve.
Liberal committee members flat out refused to hear from the former attorney general again, upon being given multiple chances to have her come before committee. They also refused to summon the majority of PMO staffers implicated by her testimony. Instead, they voted to move on, and sent a letter to the media saying that there was nothing to see here. Only three of the 11 people named by the former attorney general appeared before committee. We all know that Mr. Wernick came back again and had right of reply, something the Liberals are denying the former attorney general.
I cannot fathom what it is like to be a Liberal sitting over on the benches with those members, seeking to have one's truth be told and colleagues are saying that they cannot allow that. It really speaks to the character of members of that caucus.
Who have we not heard from? We have not heard from Katie Telford, the chief of staff to the PMO; Elder Marques; Mathieu Bouchard; Jessica Prince, the chief of staff to the former attorney general; and the Prime Minister himself. All of these people who were named by the former attorney general have not had an opportunity to come and clear their names, because certainly some egregious things were said about them. One would think the Prime Minister would want his staff to have the opportunity to clear their own names, to come and state what happened, in their opinion.
I, like the member who spoke earlier, have reserved my judgment because I do not know what has happened. Canadians do not know what has happened. The Liberals are gatekeeping on the truth and not allowing people who are involved in this scandal to come and speak. There could not be any stronger argument for a full independent public inquiry than this, following all of these revelations that keep tumbling out into the front pages of newspapers across our country.
The Liberals are trying to create this concept that there is nothing to see here, that they have done unprecedented things and everything that they can possibly do. That argument is not being accepted by opposition members. It is not being accepted by Canadians either. Everywhere I go in my riding, people are talking about what is happening. People want the former attorney general to have the other half of her story be told. It is being denied to her by her own colleagues, and Canadians see that clearly. They want the truth to come out and they deserve that truth to come out. I have never been more assured that a public inquiry is necessary.
I want to talk about fairness. The former attorney general has publicly requested the opportunity to return to the committee, which we now know will not happen. The Liberals keep saying she has already testified for four hours. However, Canadians know there were strict limits on the period of time she could discuss. She stated that over and over during her original testimony. She stated:
My narrative stops here. I must reiterate to the committee my concern, outlined in the letter to the chair yesterday. That is that Order in Council 2019-0105 addresses only my time as the Attorney General of Canada and therefore does nothing to release me from restrictions that apply to my communications while I proudly served as the Minister of Veterans Affairs...
She herself has expressed to her own colleagues that she would like to come back. Despite the Liberals' feminist rhetoric, the Prime Minister continues to actively silence her. This is especially unfair given the Clerk of the Privy Council, Michael Wernick, was allowed to testify twice.
Why is there one set of rules for powerful men in our country and another for women? The government claimed it would be different, but the proof is in the behaviour of the Liberal government, and women across Canada are not fooled. There is a reason only 26% of us are sitting in the House, and it is not because it has created the climate in the ultimate halls of power here for women to be able to speak their truth. What has happened in this very horrible display for Canadians is that Canadians now know corporations can get into the office of the PMO, can influence legislation and that the PMO is willing to allegedly pressure the former attorney general to bend the rules for Liberals.
Canadians deserve the truth and it is time for the Liberals to stop hiding it from them.
