- Member of Parliament
- Member of Parliament
- Conservative
- Brantford—Brant
- Ontario
- Voting Attendance: 60%
- Expenses Last Quarter: $129,861.80
- Government Page
- Oct/19/23 2:17:49 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, this NDP-Liberal government favours insiders and friends rather than transparency. The current international trade minister helped her friend receive government contracts with no oversight. The current public safety minister granted a licence worth $24 million to a company linked to his wife's cousin. The former finance minister and this Prime Minister pushed through an untendered contract worth more than $540 million with their good friends at the WE Charity. The list goes on and on, and now there is the $54-million ArriveCAN App, which is under police investigation for criminal activity in the highest offices of this government.
After eight years of this Prime Minister, corruption has reached outrageous levels. What is his response? Covering up the mess by hiding documents and making it impossible for the RCMP to properly investigate. He is not worth the cost, he is not above the law and he must co-operate with the RCMP.
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- Oct/18/23 5:44:13 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the good citizens and residents of my riding of Brantford—Brant.
My colleague from Dufferin—Caledon expressed his disappointment and said that it is a sad day for Canadians. It is a profoundly sad day. In terms of my involvement in this particular study, I was brought on fairly late to the game to participate in the Standing Committee on Public Accounts meeting, because its members wanted more questions asked in probing the RCMP investigation into this matter.
Before I get into the substantive part of my speech, it is important to start by reflecting on what the government telegraphed to Canadians in 2015. It telegraphed that it would be the most open, transparent and accountable government this country has ever seen.
What has happened over the last eight years? After eight years, the Prime Minister is not worth the cost. He and his government—
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Mr. Larry Brock: Madam Speaker, my friends can laugh all they want, but this is the sad reality. These are the facts. There has been scandal after scandal. There have been ethical breaches. The Prime Minister is the only prime minister in Canadian history who has been found guilty of ethical breaches not once but twice. It is not only him but also several ministers and other members of the government. We had the WE Charity, Aga Khan and SNC-Lavalin scandals, and the list goes on.
Over a year ago, it was discovered that this app, which was so essential to the government to keep Canadians safe, was a complete joke. It was highly ineffective, it was not scientific and, to make matters worse, it cost the Canadian taxpayers $54 million. We did not hear a peep from the government or the Prime Minister with respect to that price tag until it was revealed to Canadians in this House.
What did we hear from the Prime Minister? He said he thought that cost was “highly illogical” and reflected “inefficient” practices. He, in essence, conducted his own review. The Auditor General is certainly looking into this, as well as the RCMP now. His review showed that, even given the vast size of the public service, the government could not find individuals among its own consultants to create this app. The public service increased exponentially by the Liberal government, particularly during COVID and beyond. More importantly to the current investigation by the RCMP, the app was contracted for by a very small software company in Montreal, Quebec, known as Botler.
No, the government could not do it itself. It had to hire consultants. It has been revealed that there were three such consultants. I am going to name them, because it is important for Canadians to know what the individuals of these companies have done in terms of fleecing Canadian taxpayers. The three companies are GCStrategies, Dalian Enterprises and Coradix. The latter two essentially involve the same directors and CEOs.
There are three companies with a grand total of maybe six or seven employees, and they were hired by the current massive government to do the work it should be doing itself in finding individuals to perform the work. The companies do that at a substantial premium, anywhere from 30% to 40%. When Canadian taxpayers take a look at the situation, they are saying to themselves that they are already paying their taxes for the public service. They ask why they need to waste further money to have the government find software engineers in this country.
I applaud the bravery of this small software company known as Botler, because it spoke the truth. I want to quote a couple of passages, as reported in The Globe and Mail, that said, “they understand that speaking out could mean their federal funding will dry up and they are taking a big risk without knowing how it will turn out.” One of the directors said, “the issue is wider than Botler.”
This is something that affects every single Canadian, every single taxpayer dollar that is taken from very hard-working Canadians who are already struggling financially, which is given and spent through contractors, through improper means. I think that Canadians have a right to know what is going on with their hard-earned money.
When I attended, about a week and a half ago, committee during a constituency break week, it was revealed by the Auditor General, the same Auditor General who oversees all public spending and reports to this House, that she had no clue, no idea, that the RCMP were investigating criminality with respect to the contracting of the ArriveCAN app and other such apps.
When I asked her if the government had notified her in advance of her learning about this particular investigation, her answer was no. She was profoundly “disappointed”, her word, in the actions of this government, in not notifying her of a very relevant and essential part of her investigation.
It is not just, perhaps, ethical issues or improper awarding of contracts. There is now a criminal element to it. I brought to her attention that, according to Botler, this was not just misconduct at the highest level of the senior bureaucracy in this government but that it involved criminality, theft, forgery and fraud.
When prosecuted, people will be going to prison for two-plus years for fraudulently fleecing the Canadian taxpayer.
This is why not only is my colleague profoundly disappointed, but I am sick over this.
This is the government that is not accountable. This is the government that is not transparent. After that damning evidence came out, what did the Liberal-NDP coalition do? It shut down the committee. This was a two-hour meeting agreed to by every member of public accounts and it shut it down.
It says the reason was that the Auditor General could not share any further information. That was the furthest from the truth. Members of the Conservative team on that committee were just getting started. We had many more probing questions.
They are hiding something and Canadians have a right to know that. That is why I am putting on the record this criminality on behalf of this government.
That is why I rose today in the House and asked the question: will this government and will this Prime Minister co-operate with the RCMP or will he continue to hide behind cabinet confidentiality?
The motion would be amended as follows, by deleting all the words after the word “that” and substituting the following:
the sixth report of the Standing Committee on International Trade, presented on Monday, March 20, 2023, be not now concurred in, but that it be recommitted to the Standing Committee on International Trade with instruction that it amend the same to include reference to;
(a) the $54 million hard-earned Canadian tax dollars wasted on the application,
(b) the inaccurate evidence government officials provided during the committee's investigation,
(c) the serious allegations of fraudulent contract practices that are cause for grave concern,
(d) the statement made by the RCMP that they are investigating criminality in the contracts that were awarded, and
accordingly, it recommends that the Auditor General of Canada update Canadians on where the money went.
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- Nov/23/22 2:22:55 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, every day Canadians cannot help but feel like everything in this country is broken. Since the Liberals took office, we have witnessed a 32% increase in violent crime and a 92% increase in gang-related killings. Just in the last two years, hate crimes have gone up by 73%.
Not-for-profit organizations in my community are working overtime as the state of our country had 1.5 million Canadians going to a food bank. Not only has home ownership become unimaginable for many residents in my community and those across Canada, but rental costs are also soaring and are now averaging at least $2,000 a month.
Over the last seven years, everything the Prime Minister has touched breaks. As Conservatives, we will pick up the pieces the government has left behind. On this side of the House we will focus on replacing suffering with opportunity, prioritizing common sense solutions, giving Canadians back control of their lives and turning hurt into hope.
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- Jun/6/22 6:56:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, listening to my friend, his comments are completely off topic, which is par for the course for him. To take a page from the Liberal government that it ought not to take any lessons from the Conservative members who challenge the Liberal government on a daily basis in question period, perhaps he should listen to his own rhetoric. The bottom line is, if he has nothing to hide, why are Liberals consistently doing things to conceal documents that are relevant to this particular study?
Let us look at the SNC-Lavalin scandal. Let us look at the WE scandal or the Winnipeg labs scandal, where they actually had to sue the Speaker of the House. This is the pattern of the government. It is not about accountability. We want to get to the truth. Canadians want to get to the truth.
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- Jun/6/22 6:48:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am proud to be one of the members of Parliament who, along with four Senators, are working on the Special Joint Committee on the Declaration of Emergency. This committee is one of very few that requires all its members and staff to take an oath of secrecy in order to allow them to work with sensitive information and secret documents.
After a couple of meetings, the media started reporting that the Liberal government will nor reveal what information led it to use the Emergencies Act to end the protests this winter, citing cabinet confidentiality in its response to legal challenges. After discussing this issue during the committee meetings, it became obvious that the Liberal members of the committee were not prepared to permit the release of any government documents either.
My Conservative colleague, the member for Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, moved a motion that asked to throw light on the security assessments and legal opinions the government relied on when deciding to invoke the Emergencies Act for the first time in Canadian history. Members think that sounds reasonable, right? A committee that has to get to the bottom of the decision chain and find out why the Emergencies Act was invoked and how its powers were used has the right to review all the documents that the government possesses. This is how a democracy works. Unfortunately, not in this country under the rule of the Prime Minister. Most of the witnesses who appeared before our committee did not want to answer our relevant and reasonable questions. They hid behind lawyer-client privilege and cabinet confidentiality.
When I brought this issue to the House of Commons chamber and asked the Minister of Emergency Preparedness what the Prime Minister was hiding this time from Canadians, he repeated the same mantra, “there is certain information, such as lawyer-client privilege, which is respected and well established in the law in this country.” Who is the client here?
My constituents email and call my office daily. They share their concerns related to the study of the declaration of emergency committee. The Prime Minister, who promised to run the government open by default, must respect the public will and produce the documents that led him to believe that our police forces were not able to handle the situation without the invocation of the act. The PM and his government have been weakened by the changing narratives.
To date, the RCMP commissioner, OPP commissioner, and the interim and former Ottawa police chiefs have confirmed that they have never asked the government to invoke the act. The mayor of Gatineau also confirmed that neither she nor the Gatineau police requested the use of the act. These statements directly contradict the statements made by the government, which continues to justify the use of overreaching powers.
Ultimately, the question to put to the government is as follows: Now that we have a study that will prove how misinformed the public was by the government when the Prime Minister decided to use the act for his political benefit, what is the government hiding?
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- Apr/25/22 2:37:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, in 2015, the Prime Minister promised to run the most open and accountable government ever. We all remember his sunny ways. With scandal after scandal, and crisis after crisis, he has proven it is just a broken promise.
In the latest saga of the Prime Minister's dizzying mismanagement and misuse of the act, the government is now refusing to hand over to the Federal Court, under the guise of cabinet confidentiality, basic information about what information led to the use of the act. This is not how a real democracy works. What is the Prime Minister hiding this time from Canadians?
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