Mr. Speaker, it is an honour for me to once again stand in this place on behalf of the good people of Davenport in the great city of Toronto to speak to this motion put forward by the Liberals.

To touch very lightly on some of the comments by the previous speaker, who seemed to be a little unclear about whether we would be supporting this motion, and so that he understands, we will be supporting the motion.

However, just so he is also clear about some apparent trepidation, it is not so much the motion, but the record of previous Liberal governments. The Liberal Party in the House of Commons does not want Canadians to dwell on that history. I heard the member for Winnipeg North say that his party would bring these measures forward after the next election, if they were given that opportunity. I suppose one would forgive Canadians for skepticism around that promise, given that this is the party that promised to rip up the GST if they were elected, were then elected, and did not proceed to do that. It was also the party that said it would rip up the free trade agreement with the United States, were then elected, and did not rip up that trade deal. We look forward to the promises that the party makes in this place to see how much Canadians want to forget previous governments. We rest on our record and our past actions.

Speaking of that, there is no doubt among New Democrats that the government has been using public money for partisan purposes. The advertisements that the Conservatives are using on television are a clear example of that, and the cost is an outrage. However, when I listen to the debate today in this place, it seems to be more a debate of who has the worst record on this issue, the Liberals or the Conservatives. They have been going back and forth on that, as they have on many other issues, because on many issues they behave in the same way. When they are in opposition they want to be holier than thou, but we have seen both parties behave in a similar fashion.

Because it is important to the people in my riding and the people of Toronto, I want to touch on government services, access to them, and the information that Canadians need. This is vital stuff. In many ways the way to access information, to find out about government programs, is through advertising. It is a great way to serve Canadians. However, too often we see that it has become a way to serve the Conservative Party. This is wrong. This has to stop. We need much greater transparency, much greater oversight.

I have many immigrants in my riding. Many people in my community are trying to bring their families to Canada. They have been promised, through the immigration system in this country, that when they have their status, they too can apply to be reunited with their parents and grandparents. I want to tell a quick story because it connects to the opportunities that communications have for government.

One constituent came into my office with an application that she had sent. It had been stamped as being received on January 4, but her application to bring her father from the home country was denied. There was no explanation. The government had said through advertising that it was accepting 5,000 sponsorship applications for parents and grandparents and it was capping it at that.

My constituent couriered her application in. It was received January 1. There was no explanation for why it was denied and no recourse. We phoned Citizenship and Immigration. It did not even have a record of it, even though we have a stamp that says it was received. The reason I bring this up is that this constituent had been told that there was a cap of 5,000, and she knew she had to get the application in right away. The government gave her no explanation.

We have Service Canada, where many immigrants access services in a variety of languages. A couple of years ago, the very busy office in my riding was closed, leaving many in my community very concerned, because they would go and speak face to face with people in that office. I bring this up because this is about interfacing with government. This is about access to government services. This is not about spending millions of dollars on government propaganda trying to tell Canadians all the great work the government is doing while wasting opportunities and wasting money, and in fact, not giving Canadians, certainly not the people in my riding, the information they need to live a decent life here in our country. That is what concerns me about the misuse of public money.

We have been leading a campaign for greater protection for unpaid interns in the country. The government could have spent a fraction of that money to let young people know what their rights are, to let them know that they in fact have no rights under federal regulations as unpaid interns. It could have spent a little money to let young people know that if they took an unpaid internship in a federally regulated industry, they would have no protection under the Canada Labour Code. It could have let Canadians know that. It did not. Unfortunately, that has led to injured young workers, and tragically, to the death of one young worker in Alberta. Luckily the government bowed to our pressure and included measures in the budget to protect interns. However, it could have let people know this.

In other words, there are huge opportunities lost, and for the government, massive amounts of public money wasted on partisan adventures.

Andrew Cash

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