SoVote

Mr. Luc Berthold (Mégantic—L'Érable, CPC)

Apr/8/24 3:51:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, today we are discussing an important issue. The Speaker recognized that there might have been a breach of parliamentary privilege stemming from a situation that has been discussed at length in the media. Unfortunately, I find that Quebeckers are not talking about it enough. That will come, however, since, given the extent of the situation surrounding the Prime Minister's ArriveCAN scandal, we are now resorting to taking historic action in the House: summoning a witness to the bar. For the people watching, I would like to clarify that “the bar” is a golden bar located at the entrance to the House of Commons. Only members of Parliament and pages can be admitted to the House. Exceptionally, someone will be permitted to come to the bar to testify and answer for their actions. The actions for which the witness is criticized are not having answered questions put to him by a committee, lying when questioned by parliamentarians, and not having taken the study of the ArriveCAN scandal undertaken by the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates seriously. The motion is clear. Kristian Firth, one of the two owners, managers and employees of GC Strategies, is being asked to appear to receive an admonishment from the Speaker. This is what is called getting a slap on the wrist from the Speaker. Mr. Firth is being asked to answer questions asked of him and appearing in the 17th report of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates. He is also being asked to answer additional questions that might arise from the questions he is asked here in the House. This is important. The credibility of our parliamentary system depends on it. The purpose of parliamentary committees is to fuel debates in the House. They are intended to allow members to delve further into an issue, to question people and situations so that we have all the information we need to make the right decisions and pass laws. That is why all of the bills introduced in the House must go through the committee process. The people who table bills must come answer questions in committee. Witnesses may be invited to help us make the right decisions. That helps both the government and the opposition parties. It is also an opportunity to hold the government to account for its actions. Things happen sometimes, or reports get published like the one from the Auditor General, that reveal the chaos around management of the ArriveCAN application. To date, this application, which should have cost $80,000, has cost $60 million. The exact amount is not yet known. Not even the Auditor General could pinpoint it. Of these $60 million, $20 million went to a company that acted as a go-between. This company was contracted to develop a computer application, but has no IT knowledge. All it knows is how LinkedIn works, and how to connect people so the government can implement its contracts. It is entirely unreasonable to pay millions of taxpayer dollars to companies that serve as fronts or intermediaries and do no work. Consequently, parliamentarians wanted to find out more. In committee, they questioned the firm GC Strategies. By the way, “GC Strategies” is the name of a private company. It is no surprise that the name starts with the letters “GC”, since the company wants to imply that it has special ties with the Government of Canada, as in “Government of Canada Strategies”. The company demonstrated its lack of rigour in the work it did. Furthermore, it truly sought to squeeze this government for as much as possible. Witnesses who appeared before the committee did not want to answer questions. They took the summons to appear before the parliamentary committee with a grain of salt, thinking it was no big deal, that they could refuse to answer questions, and nothing would come of it, as has too often happened in the past. Unfortunately, the example comes from on high. We saw this in other parliamentary committees when, in the SNC-Lavalin affair, the Minister of Justice was subjected to political pressure to make a decision and could not get answers either from the public servants involved or from the Prime Minister and his team. He hid behind cabinet confidence to avoid speaking the truth and avoid suffering the consequences. The result is that the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner submitted a report. He found the Prime Minister guilty of a breach of ethics. What was the consequence for the Prime Minister? He said he took full responsibility for his actions and would ensure that it never happened again. It is therefore not surprising that, subsequently, witnesses appear at a parliamentary committee believing it is not a big deal if they do not answer questions, for absolutely nothing will happen. This time, however, we said no. All the parties said no, enough is enough, people have to answer. We should proceed this way so witnesses give the whole truth when they testify and understand the importance of their testimony before a committee, not only for parliamentarians, but also for Canadians. I myself have witnessed certain situations in the ArriveCAN file. I asked one of the officials to name the company that recommended GC Strategies, and had to ask three questions before the officials finally agreed to name the company GC Strategies. That is completely unacceptable. It is time that the House of Commons, and we all, as parliamentarians, put a stop to this to make sure these kind of things do not happen again. I want to give a few examples so that people understand the situation clearly. Here is an example of a question Mr. Firth was asked that he did not want to answer. On GC Strategies' website, there is a statement that says, “GCstrategies listen and try to find solutions to my problems vs. selling me a solution to a problem I've never had.” This quote is attributed to a senior executive in the Government of Canada. A senior executive said that about GC Strategies. Mr. Firth was asked who this senior executive was who had so much respect for his company. Believe it or not, Mr. Firth refused to answer that simple question. However the quote was on the homepage of their website, which, unfortunately, we can no longer find. A search for gcstrategies.ca now leads to a GoDaddy site. The site is no more. Fortunately we have screenshots, which I have in my hands right now, although I cannot show them. Here is another example. GC Strategies quoted an assistant deputy minister. That is something. That is in the higher echelons of government. Apparently, the assistant deputy minister said that the company took the time to understand their client's business and vision, and so on. It was a glowing comment praising GC Strategies. Mr. Firth was asked who was that voluble assistant deputy minister who was so full of praise and goodwill towards his company. Mr. Firth refused to answer the parliamentarians. Why do we need to know that? Because we need to update the entire procedure, solve the existing problem that allows companies like GC Strategies to develop an app that should cost $80,000 but ends up costing taxpayers $60 million. The owners of the company developed the app out of their basement with no IT knowledge whatsoever. My colleague, the member for Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, who is the opposition critic on ethics, was very clear. He has a list of some of the lies told by Mr. Firth. In particular, Mr. Firth was asked whether he had ever lied to a parliamentary committee. He refused to answer. He did not want to lie twice. He was asked which public office holders he met with outside government offices. He refused to answer. That is important, because we need to know who this company’s connections are to find out how it managed to obtain so many contracts when it has so few employees. We need answers to these questions. Mr. Firth was asked a simple question. The member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan asked Mr. Firth how many hours he spent working on sending LinkedIn invitations. That is not a difficult question. He could have said one, two, three hours. He refused to answer the question. This is an extraordinary situation that demands an extraordinary response. For too long now, witnesses appearing before parliamentary committees have ceased taking the work we do in the House seriously. With the multitude of Liberal scandals we are currently dealing with, witnesses need to know that there are consequences to not telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in a parliamentary committee. That is why I support this motion to call Mr. Firth to testify at the bar.

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Context: House Hansard - 295 - Apr/8/24

Mr. John Brassard (Barrie—Innisfil, CPC)

Apr/8/24 4:57:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we completely agree with the Bloc Québécois member on this issue. The integrity of parliamentary committees is paramount. We have seen witnesses appear in committee, including the ethics committee, and not answer questions. When we call someone to the bar to testify before a committee, we want to send them the message that parliamentarians are entitled to full and truthful answers every time anyone appears before a committee. That is the message we are going to send to the next witnesses who appear in committee. Does she agree with that?

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Context: House Hansard - 295 - Apr/8/24

Mr. Jasraj Singh Hallan

Apr/8/24 6:13:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am rising today to inform the House that the finance committee will be debating a motion to have Canada's premiers testify on the Prime Minister's 23% carbon tax increase. Eight provincial premiers are now opposed to the Prime Minister's carbon tax. I hope all parties will vote yes to allow premiers to testify on the Prime Minister's carbon tax scam.

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