Senator Martin: Transparency is one of the many serious problems with the Canada Infrastructure Bank. For example, it was revealed late last year that the $1.7‑billion Lake Erie Connector project had actually been cancelled in July. However, if you check the Canada Infrastructure Bank’s website today, you can still see a press release announcing this project. There have been no answers to legitimate questions surrounding the awarding of Canada Infrastructure Bank contracts to McKinsey, which has extensive ties to this bank from its creation to this day, and now we have what looks like a mostly internal review process. So, leader, why is there so much secrecy surrounding this process? Could you tell us if the contract given to McKinsey by the Canada Infrastructure Bank will be part of the five-year review?

Hon. Yonah Martin (Deputy Leader of the Opposition): My question also concerns the Canada Infrastructure Bank. In fact, it is legislated for a five-year review. Minister LeBlanc is required to bring forward a report to Parliament by the end of June.

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According to documents obtained through Access to Information and Privacy and released last week by the Canadian Union of Public Employees, this review began in June 2022 but has had no public engagement and no public information on the process being followed. Yesterday, a senior official from Infrastructure Canada told our National Finance Committee that they have opened some public consultation.

Leader, could you tell us when this consultation began and if it’s still open? Were all Canadians invited to comment or just those groups and individuals chosen by the Trudeau government?

Hon. Yonah Martin (Deputy Leader of the Opposition): Honourable senators, my question for the government leader also concerns the Canada Infrastructure Bank.

In April of 2021, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, PBO, released his most recent report on the Canada Infrastructure Bank. The PBO’s analysis concluded that the Canada Infrastructure Bank was losing money, unlikely to deliver on its mandate and would miss its own infrastructure spending targets by over 50%. Yet the Canada Infrastructure Bank is very good at spending taxpayer dollars on bonuses, as Senator Plett has just mentioned.

Senator Gold, does your government disagree with the findings of the independent Parliamentary Budget Officer?

Senator Martin: When announcing the creation of the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the Trudeau government claimed it would attract four to five dollars in private capital for every tax dollar invested. In the five years of the Canada Infrastructure Bank’s existence, this has never occurred or even come close. The Canada Infrastructure Bank’s website currently shows that of $19.4 billion invested so far, about $7.2 billion is from private and institutional investors, and the rest appears to come from different levels of government — in other words, taxpayers.

In February, Minister LeBlanc acknowledged before a House committee that he was not satisfied with the Canada Infrastructure Bank’s ability to raise funds from private investors. Isn’t that grounds for scrapping the Canada Infrastructure Bank, leader?