SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 337 - Sep/17/24

Sep/17/24 12:43:19 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it was certainly poignant when Kristian Firth was called to the bar in a historic moment and refused to acknowledge any shame for the abuse of tax dollars. To speak to the member's point, we have seen a breakdown of the processes that are supposed to ensure accountability when it comes to all aspects of how government is contracted. It seems as though the Liberals will move heaven and earth to benefit their friends, but they refuse to hold on to the basic level of accountability that Canadians expect.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Sep/17/24 12:44:38 p.m.
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Before we go to the next speaker, I am ready to rule on the point of order that the hon. member for Windsor West brought forward. After reviewing Hansard, I want to ask the hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot to rise in the House to withdraw his comments and to apologize not only to the member for Windsor West but also to the leader of the NDP.

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Mr. Damien Kurek (Battle River—Crowfoot, CPC)

Sep/17/24 12:44:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I apologize and withdraw them.

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Mr. Larry Brock (Brantford—Brant, CPC)

Sep/17/24 12:44:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to start by saying what an honour and privilege it is to rise for the first time in our fall session and speak to a topic that I have had the privilege of participating in largely throughout the summer, as well as for the past year or so in numerous committees. This is a topic that has dominated the landscape of Canadian politics. I want to pick up where my colleague just left off in terms of the themes of my speech, which will largely be about trust and accountability. There have been so many scandals at the heart of the corrupt Liberal government, but this scandal in particular strikes at the hearts of Canadians whom I have spoken to from across this country. It shows how poor our procurement system is and how much chaos has been created by individuals who should have taken responsibility and provided the proper oversight but clearly did not. Therefore, let us focus on GC Strategies. I know the Liberal members will probably not like what I am about to say, because I was often interrupted in numerous committees, but from what Kristian Firth himself said, he specifically chose the name GC Strategies for a purpose. GC stands for “Government of Canada”, and it is important to highlight this here in the House and to share that with Canadians. It exemplifies the type of rotten, improper relationship that Kristian Firth has had with the Government of Canada. Some hon. members: Oh, oh! Mr. Larry Brock: I do not need to hear chirping, Madam Speaker. Perhaps you want to address those individuals, who should know better. They are certainly not new to Parliament, but I sure am used to their interruptions. I will continue. Kristian Firth was part of a two-person firm operating with no bricks and mortar and largely working out of a basement. He was essentially performing services that could have and should have been performed by Canada's professional public service. He was essentially a recruiter. He did not perform any IT work. He did not discharge any technical experience with the creation of the app. He merely connected the CBSA and other federal departments with professionals in the Ottawa and surrounding areas to create an app that had an original estimated cost to Canadians of $80,000. He literally opened up his rolodex, his contact sheet, and found the required individuals for the government to work with. I put that particular question on numerous occasions to a number of professionals who testified at committee, particularly the union heads of several organizations that speak to Canada's professional public service. They confirmed to me not only that the recruitment could have been done in-house but also that the actual creation of this approximately $60-million boondoggle of an ineffective app could have been done in-house. Instead, the government claims that this was a pandemic and we had to move fast. Corners were cut, and no documentation was saved; no one is accepting responsibility. We have the Auditor General, who basically says that the pandemic is no excuse for throwing out basic accounting principles. I highlight her summary that the best she could glean with the scattered documentation she was able to receive allowed her to put out an estimate of $60 million. This is precisely why this motion is not only appropriate in its timing but also relevant in its purpose. We need to have an accurate picture as to how many more millions of dollars were funnelled to GC Strategies to pad the pockets of other insiders, other individuals who actually did no work. We know the procurement general has already estimated that 76% of all subcontractors who were hired, who were paid by to work on the app using taxpayer funds, did no work on the app. This is precisely why the opposition parties all voted in favour of the government providing us with a detailed blueprint as to how it would recoup the millions of dollars that were wasted, with no oversight and no accountability. The committee work we did has clearly shown and demonstrated to Canadians that there is a significant trust issue with how the Government of Canada is operating and procuring with outside consultants. We know that, in 2015, the Prime Minister promised he would reduce the amount of outside consultants working with the Government of Canada. However, that certainly has not been the case. My colleague who spoke previously was quite accurate in stating that over 20-billion taxpayer dollars has been sent to outside consultants. That is taxpayer money that should not have been spent. It was spent foolishly, without checks and balances. It is precisely why I have pursued a line of questioning not only to examine the wasted billions of dollars but also to explore the criminality behind the operations of GC Strategies. I just want to pause for a moment on that issue because we also heard evidence at committees that, within a couple of years after Kristian Firth's work on the ArriveCAN app, he was working with a small software company in Montreal named Botler. His handling of Botler also raised national headlines and brought to light just how inappropriate, how loose and how free Mr. Firth was with our criminal laws. Here is a case in point: Botler was working on an app that, I believe, the justice department was interested in at the time. Mr. Firth took the résumés of the two founders of Botler and determined that their experience was insufficient; however, he wanted to justify the government's working with Botler. He admitted under oath, on a few occasions at committee, that he deliberately and intentionally altered the details of their résumés to ensure they reached a certain threshold for qualification. As a former justice participant, I can say that this is outright fraud. It is not only fraud, but it is also forgery. I have been pushing the RCMP to investigate Kristian Firth on that point alone, in addition to his ill-gotten gains with respect to the ArriveCAN app. We can let this point sink in: A person who performs no professional work, merely makes a connection between the Government of Canada and an IT professional from the comfort of his basement, perhaps on a nice taxpayer-funded leather couch and watching television on a nice 100-inch screen, received $20 million of taxpayer funds. As I have often said in the House and at committee, talk about hitting the taxpayer lottery. It is no small wonder that when the RCMP commissioner testified at committee, he would not get into the particulars of what criminal charges the RCMP were investigating as they related to Kristian Firth and his partner on the ArriveCAN scam, but he did indicate that there was an open investigation. Moreover, he also confirmed to me that there were at least another half-dozen investigations into the ArriveCAN scam.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Sep/17/24 12:56:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there is one fundamental flaw in what the member is trying to portray. He is attempting to mislead Canadians, quite frankly. The member knows full well that inappropriate behaviour has not been condoned in any form by this government. In fact, when it was discovered that there was inappropriate behaviour, the government acted quickly by ensuring there was a process to assure Canadians, the taxpayers, that there would be accountability and there would be a consequence for those who had violated the procedures in place to protect the taxpayer. The member intentionally tried to give the impression that it is the Liberal Party or the government, the politicians, that has not protected the interests of the taxpayer when that is just not true. If we want to look at a scandal where politicians were trying to cover something up, look at the $400-million ETS scandal of the Harper era, which the Conservatives across the way are absolutely silent on.

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Mr. Larry Brock

Sep/17/24 12:57:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, if the member looks in the mirror, he will see inappropriate behaviour, not only by him but by the entire government. The government has done nothing other than try to hide, obfuscate and distance itself from this scandal. Every single member of the Liberal Party voted down the Auditor General investigating the ArriveCAN scam. That was on November 2, 2022. Over the course of numerous committees, it was the Liberal Party that routinely shut down debate, refusing to hear from the Auditor General and the RCMP commissioner. Yes, I do blame the Liberals. They are responsible, and their ministers refuse to accept responsibility for this boondoggle.

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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné (Terrebonne, BQ)

Sep/17/24 12:58:28 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his speech and his work on the ArriveCAN file. I know that he questioned the witnesses effectively. Working with him is a pleasure. However, I have noticed a tendency in the Conservative Party lately. Additional requests to the Auditor General have increased significantly, on top of the work already being done by the Office of the Auditor General. If the Conservatives were to form a government, would they increase the budget of the Office of the Auditor General?

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Mr. Larry Brock

Sep/17/24 12:59:02 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, when the leader of the Conservative Party forms government, and he will, and becomes Canada's next prime minister, we will ensure that all of these scandals are fully explored and will, indeed, ensure that resources are available to the Auditor General so she can complete her job and provide a more fulsome picture as to how much more the government has fleeced the taxpayer. We know it is approximately $60 million, and that is the tip of the iceberg. We need to find out more.

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Mr. Greg McLean (Calgary Centre, CPC)

Sep/17/24 1:00:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak to this motion to make sure that we continue to look into this as much as we can. We have to ensure that Canadians get their eyes on it and that the government does not bury it under the floor one more time and say that while it is incompetent, it is not guilty of anything. Well, incompetence is guilt in itself. It is $60 million that we have identified so far of money going off the table that belongs to Canadians. This money is going from one hand to the hands of people who are well connected with the Liberal Party of Canada. This cannot continue. It is not the only instance where this has happened. It happens again and again. This is one instance where the Liberals have tried to obfuscate in the House of Commons and at committee repeatedly in order to not have this looked at. For my colleagues across the way to pretend at this point in time that they want to get to the bottom of this is completely false and is misleading the House in the greatest sense. I cannot believe he stands up and says this after leading his caucus in voting against all of the transparency that we have tried to bring to the table and against getting this matter before Parliament and before Canadians to make sure the government has some accountability and transparency in what it does for Canadians with Canadian taxpayer dollars. My colleague talked earlier about what Canadians contribute in taxes to run the government. Right now, they see very clearly that the government is misusing those taxes again and again. It is spending on its friends. It is spending excessively through all kinds of measures in order to whittle away the hard-working tax dollars of Canadians. We were almost $50 billion in deficit this past year, and getting back to balance is, of course, very important. I know that $60 million in a sea of $50 billion looks like a drop, but this drop is indicative of how bad and how insincere the government is as far as accountability goes. Our friends do not worry about it; it is a drop in the bucket, but it is not a drop in the bucket. It is a significant amount of money that Canadians no longer have. Canadians have contributed to running the government, and the respect the government is showing for their money and the taxes they pay is not there. Any government has to allocate scarce resources. The number one thing, whenever we are allocating resources, is to allocate scarce resources as effectively as possible. That is not happening here whatsoever. Whenever Liberals can get money from some program or another into the hands of their friends, they will do it. That is a problem we are here to unearth. The number one role of His Majesty's loyal opposition is, of course, to make sure that we hold the government to account on what it is doing for Canadians with Canadian dollars. At this point in time, we have seen repeated instances of misuse, this one being the most egregious we have shown so far in the House of Commons, one the Liberals have tried to hide several times. This is very important for Canadians to understand. We are doing our job. We are doing our job in holding the government to account on its misuse of Canadian taxpayer dollars, its nepotism in giving to insiders and friends and its non-delivery of real programs to Canadians. Canadians need a government that responds to their needs. This one is not responding to their needs. It is responding to the needs of its friends, who are getting an excess return right now because they see a government that has no accountability whatsoever. While the government is here, it will just use the money printer and put a bunch of dollars in their jeans. Canadians expect much better from the House. Canadians expect much better from the people who run this country. I have heard my colleague across the way blame this on bureaucrats. Somewhere the buck has to stop. This is the government that recently raised taxes on capital gains, so more Canadians are paying more money to the government so it can shovel more out unaccountably through the back door. When it goes out badly, that is just the bureaucrats' mistake. That is not their problem, because they do not provide leadership in this realm. What we need to do is ensure that we get some accountability, that this is exposed and that we make some procedures available so it does not happen again. I have seen enough of people trying to shovel this under the rug. This is very important. We had a man brought to the bar in the House of Commons for the first time in almost a century. That was obviously an exception, so something exceptional happened here. One of the people who was very connected with this party deemed that he did not have to provide available information, which was required, at a parliamentary committee. The committee chair told him that he was in contempt, and he was brought here to Parliament to answer to the person who was in the chair at that point in time, acting as judge. He was compelled to give evidence, and in that giving of evidence, he showed absolutely no shame: “I took the money. I have the money. Tough luck.” That was the money of a bad government that has no checks and balances to make sure that Canadians' dollars are spent wisely and effectively to deliver programs for the benefit of Canadians. That did not happen here. It did not happen here in an egregious sense. We have to stand up as the opposition and make sure we expose that for what it is. It is a gross oversight of the Liberals, and they are trying to avoid accountability for it. Our job here is to make sure they own it and put procedures in place so they cannot say that while they are incompetent, they are not guilty of anything that they should go to jail for, or anyone should go to jail for for that matter. They are completely incompetent, and we have already proven that over the last nine years. The Liberals cannot balance a budget. They cannot deliver programs. It is a government all about narrative and no execution whatsoever and it has lost the faith of Canadians. It is time to move on and get to a government that is actually accountable, provides transparency for Canadians and shows respect for the dollars that Canadians contribute to the tax system in Canada. That is not happening and it is a shame. We hope to bring that to a head. We have some mechanisms in this House of Commons, and we are going to continue to use those mechanisms to hold the government to account.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Sep/17/24 1:08:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, talking about extreme statements, let me give an example. This is how the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada inspired his Conservative caucus just last Sunday. He said, referencing the carbon tax, that the Liberal government's plan to increase the price would cause a “nuclear winter” for the economy. “There would be mass hunger and malnutrition with a tax this high...our seniors would have to turn the heat down to 14 or 13 C just to make it through the winter.” So said the leader. This is the extreme MAGA right Conservative Party, the reformers, who want to paint a picture that Canada is broken. We have seen extreme positions. The member spoke about Liberal friends. I do not even think that company had a Liberal Party membership. I have no idea. It is just extreme, everything that they say. Why should Canadians believe the extreme right of the Conservative Party today? That is the question that I have for the member opposite. They are stupid ideas. It is a stupid statement.

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Mr. Greg McLean

Sep/17/24 1:09:32 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for the name-calling and vitriol. I apologize if I have gotten under his skin one more time. It seems like it is a habit here. We need a government that is accountable. That was the entire perspective of my speech. I hope he listened to some of the words I said, rather than just speak off his cheap little talking notes. We need accountability in government and he should stand for accountability in government. I know he tries to avoid that at every step and tries to cover up the mistakes his government continues to make. As I have said, incompetence is as bad as being complicit in the crime that has been committed.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

Sep/17/24 1:10:19 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my colleague from Calgary Centre always adopts the right tone in addressing these issues, which need to be raised. They are the result of this government being worn out and the culture of cronyism that is too often part of the Liberal brand. Once again, the country will go further into debt, and this will have a very negative impact on Canadians and their trust in their government. This explains why Quebeckers want to separate from this country and go their own way. Having said that, I would like to ask my hon. colleague the following. How can we ensure this never happens again? Could the government, possibly a Conservative government, commit to maintaining and increasing the Auditor General's funding to ensure that these scandals can be exposed?

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Mr. Greg McLean

Sep/17/24 1:11:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is a good question. We will have a Conservative government in the near future, and we will work in the public interest to ensure that Canadians' money is spent as wisely as possible. I am sure my colleague will work with us to ensure that these funds are well spent.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Sep/17/24 1:11:43 p.m.
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It is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith the question necessary to dispose of the motion now before the House. The question is on the motion. If a member participating in person wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division, or if a member of a recognized party participating in person wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Sep/17/24 1:12:17 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we would request a recorded vote.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Sep/17/24 1:12:31 p.m.
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Pursuant to Standing Order 45, the division stands deferred until later this day at the expiry of the time provided for Oral Questions.

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Mr. Tom Kmiec (Calgary Shepard, CPC)

Sep/17/24 1:12:49 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have two petitions to table quickly today. The first petition is from constituents whom I heard from over the summer. They are very concerned with the fact that the medical assistance in dying regime has not been banned entirely for those with mental health conditions. The petitioners are calling on the Government of Canada to stop the expansion of medical assistance in dying to those with only mental illness as an underlying condition.

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Mr. Tom Kmiec (Calgary Shepard, CPC)

Sep/17/24 1:13:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the second petition is from my constituents who, over the summer, made this very clear to me. The petitioners are asking for the House of Commons to call for non-confidence in the government and call for an election within the next 45 days.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib.)

Sep/17/24 1:13:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to table a petition again today regarding health care. This petition is dealing with the important relationship between Canadians and health care professionals, in particular nurses of all forms. The petitioners are asking both levels of government to take the actions necessary to demonstrate their support with everything from compensation to credentials being recognized. These are all very important issues, and they are asking governments of all levels to, in essence, work together to try to resolve some of these outstanding issues.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Sep/17/24 1:14:24 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand at this time. The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes): Is that agreed? Some hon. members: Agreed.

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