Interrupting a day of debate on wanton constitutional vandalism, QP started off with Thomas Mulcair reading off a question about EI auditors “shadowing” claimants, to which Harper responded with some bog-standard response about EI being there when they need it. Mulcair then moved onto a question about Flaherty’s back-and-forth policy changes without consultation, and treated the Peter DeVries and Scott Clark article as though they were still currently employed by the department. Harper sang Flaherty’s praises in response. Mulcair carried on, citing Flaherty’s breach of ethics over the CRTC letter, not that Harper’s vigorous praises were diminished any less. Chris Charlton finished off the leader’s round, asking about EI training funds, but Jim Flaherty assured her that they consulted broadly on the budget. Bob Rae was up next, keeping up the issue of the EI training funds, but Harper touted just how transparent his government is as a non-sequitur response. Rae then brought up Dr. Arthur Porter’s party donations while he was SIRC chair, and wondered how he managed to escape a security clearance. Harper insisted that none of the allegations against Porter had to do with his time at SIRC — skirting the issue of donations. For his final question, Rae wondered why there wasn’t an inquiry into Jeffrey Delisle’s security breaches, but Harper told him that they’re not unique to Canada, and brought up the Bradley Manning case in the States.
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QP: They’re not cuts, they’re changes
With Members’ Statements getting rowdy before Question Period even started, Speaker Scheer warned, “let’s not have this again.” And really, we didn’t. QP was fairly listless overall. Thomas Mulcair started out reading a question on the $10 billion in cuts to Old Age Security, to which Harper said that no, there were no cuts but changes coming in 2023. Mulcair moved onto the topic of the Parliamentary Budget Officer not getting the information he requested, to which Harper responded that they wrote the Act that created the position, and they report that information to Parliament. Megan Leslie was up next wondering why it was that the FAQ page on about the Navigational Waters Act was pulled down from the government’s website, to which Lebel said that they were fixing “erroneous information” about that Act on the site. Down the memory hole it goes (excepting of course for Google cache and the Library and Archives Canada backup copy). Bob Rae was up next, asking if the changes to OAS were really worth it considering the negligible percentage of money that it affected, but Harper insisted it was all about future sustainability. For his final question, Rae asked why the government wasn’t prosecuting some HSBC tax evasion cases, to which Harper insisted that they don’t tolerate that behaviour, and that CRA was investigating.