Hansard Apr. 15, 05: QP -- Sponsorship Program & Justice -- "Do the Liberals intend to run a fourth election campaign with dirty money, yes or no?"

Hansard April 15/05 Oral Question Period

Sponsorship Program

Hon. Rob Nicholson (Niagara Falls, CPC): Mr. Speaker, yesterday we heard testimony from one of the star witnesses at the Gomery commission. I think I can summarize Mr. Corriveau's testimony in this way. The more money he received from the Liberals, the less he remembered. Is that not lovely?

We do not need a final report from the Gomery commission and we do not need a court order to get the government to start paying back money.

Why does the Prime Minister not do the right thing, get his friends in the Liberal Party together, tell them that the jig is up, that all the commissions, kickbacks, and dirty money they have received should be returned to the people?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the individual attacks a witness before the Gomery commission. His leader has in fact said that some of the witnesses are lying. The deputy leader over there has accused some of the testimony as being a sham.

[. . . . ]

Hon. Rob Nicholson (Niagara Falls, CPC): Mr. Speaker, next week, the House will adopt a motion proposing that the Liberal Party put in a trust account the dirty money from the sponsorships. The Prime Minister has already endorsed the idea. He said they had made it very clear that this money would be put in a trust account, and his Minister of Transport said the same thing. However, yesterday, in the House, the Minister of Public Works and Government Services contradicted his leader.

Do the Liberals intend to run a fourth election campaign with dirty money, yes or no?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.):. . . if it received inappropriate funds, it will refund taxpayers.

[English]


Hon. Rob Nicholson (Niagara Falls, CPC): . . . we have witnessed the worst fraud and corruption this country has seen since Confederation, and yet, throughout that period of time, the government has refused to answer questions on this.

I want to remind the government that the Canadian House of Commons is the highest democratic institution in this country, and we deserve answers on this and every question every day.

What does the minister have to hide? Why does he not come clean and start paying that money back to Canadians now?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.): [. . . . ] That independent judicial inquiry is actually working quite well and progressing properly, and is getting to the truth. The way Canadians will get to that truth is to have the report from Justice Gomery.

There certainly is no need for a parallel inquiry, [. . . . ]

Mrs. Diane Ablonczy (Calgary—Nose Hill, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the government tries to make Canadians believe that money skimmed off the sponsorship program by the Liberal Party will be recovered, but the government's promises evaporate when it comes time to act.

Yesterday a motion in the House simply asked that the Prime Minister keep his promise to set up a trust fund. People should have seen the Liberals run for cover. They even tried to completely gut the motion.


Why did the Prime Minister break his clear commitment?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister keeps his promises [. . . . ]


Mrs. Diane Ablonczy (Calgary—Nose Hill, CPC): Mr. Speaker, I would like to tell mister diversionary tactic over there that this is exactly what the Prime Minister publicly promised: “We've made it very clear that in fact, we will put that money into trust”.

His Quebec minister pledged over a year ago that hundreds of thousands of dollars that went to the Liberal Party from sponsorship ad agencies would be put into a special account.

Yesterday the Liberal government had a chance to put its money where its mouth is. Why did it choke?

Hon. Scott Brison (Minister of Public Works and Government Services, Lib.):. . . the Minister of Transport has been clear and the party has been clear that any funds received from inappropriate sources would be returned and will be returned to the Canadian taxpayer.

I draw the hon. member's attention to the Winnipeg Free Press editorial today, which says:

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an allegation made before an inquiry is not...a conviction in a court of law. [. . . . ]


Mr. Michel Gauthier (Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean, BQ): Mr. Speaker, the government, still in search of the dirty money, claims that there is none in the Liberal Party coffers. However,
the riding associations have very substantial funds, some of which are from the former personal trust funds of a number of Liberal ministers and MPs.

Will the government admit that it is quite possible, even probable, that some of the dirty sponsorship money now belongs to Liberal Party riding associations, after transiting through the former trust funds, which are outside—

[. . . . ] (1125)

[. . . . ]
Mr. Michel Gauthier (Roberval—Lac-Saint-Jean, BQ): Mr. Speaker, Parliament reformed political party financing in the fall of 2003. One of the measures imposed by the government concerned
the blind transfer of funds from personal trusts to the riding associations before midnight on December 31, 2003. That is the reality.

Will the government admit that this was a huge money laundering operation, which probably wiped out all traces of sponsorship money in the trust funds?

Hon. Mauril Bélanger (Deputy Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Minister responsible for Official Languages, Minister responsible for Democratic Reform and Associate Minister of National Defence, Lib.):. . . . go to the Elections Canada web site, which has all the information on all the riding associations for all the registered parties.


Ms. Pauline Picard (Drummond, BQ): Mr. Speaker, we are hearing about cash payments, phoney invoices, salaries paid by agencies, and now about the laundering of trust money on December 31, 2003.

Will the government admit that the audit done by Deloitte & Touche involved only the books of the Liberal Party, and did not in any way include the books of the riding associations, on which there were millions of dollars, some of it transferred from MPs' and ministers' personal trust funds?

[. . . . ] Ms. Pauline Picard (Drummond, BQ): Mr. Speaker, on December 31, 2003, the government used the political party funding legislation to organize the blind transfer of sums of money from trust accounts.

Will the government admit that part of the dirty money is with the riding associations, because millions of dollars were transferred to them on December 31, 2003, without any control by the chief electoral officer?

[. . . . ]


Justice

Mr. Gord Brown (Leeds—Grenville, CPC): Mr. Speaker, anyone familiar with justice in Canada, including violent crime victims, must have been shocked yesterday to hear the justice minister say that mandatory minimum sentences did not deter crime. I understand Liberal nervousness about crimes with mandatory jail sentences. I was asking about crimes with knives, not cash envelopes and chequebooks.

Could the minister explain his outrageous view, which is an insult to crime victims, police and law-abiding Canadians who demand protection?

Hon. Paul Harold Macklin (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, the hon. member really should do a little research. If he did the research, he would find that mandatory minimum penalties do not generally work.

[. . . . ]

Mr. Gord Brown (Leeds—Grenville, CPC): Mr. Speaker, the minister's academic banter may sound enlightened in the we know best taxpayer subsidized limousine lecture hall, but it rings hollow to people victimized by knife crimes and the police who fight crime on our streets each and every day.

Could the minister explain yesterday's answer in light of existing mandatory minimum sentences for firearm homicide, drunk driving and other crimes? Is he perhaps looking at a Liberal knife registry?

Hon. Paul Harold Macklin (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.): Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member looks at the record, he will find that we have more mandatory minimum sentences relating to gun use and gun crime than any other area within our law.[. . . . ] Mandatory minimums are there, but we also need to put resources with our police. We need to ensure the police have all the tools necessary to meet the needs of our communities.