Like the boy who murdered his parents and then complained he was an orphan, Liberal MP Iqra Khalid just doesn’t get it.“When Conservative colleagues call it Arrive-scam instead of the ArriveCan app, it is impacting public trust,” she told the House of Commons public accounts committee. Well not really, madam. Your trust horse was out of the stable and over the gate a long time before Conservatives began saying that. In Ms. Khalid's case, it is of course professional amnesia. What you remember, you have to account for. But lest we all walk with her down that serene, grey lane of oblivion, here are seven ways this government has given Canadians every reason not to trust a word any of them say. 1) In 2015, a campaigning Justin Trudeau told Canadians that the economy would be fine, "budgets balance themselves."2) As prime minister, he would later dismiss an inconvenient question with this rhetorical wave of the hand, “You’ll forgive me if I don’t think about monetary policy.” The consequences of 1) and 2) are manifest in $9/lb butter and a mortgage-mashing 5% central bank rate. Canadians are going broke and turning to credit. On matters financial, there can be no trust. They're amateurs.3) PMO influence in the SNC-Lavalin affair... That lot, the reader will recall, involved undue influence upon the office of the federal attorney general, at that time occupied by Jody Wilson-Raybold. Ultimately however, it was about trying to get a Quebec company off the hook, after it had been accused of offering bribes. Can all large Canadian enterprises rely upon the gracious intervention of their Liberal government? To pose the question is to position the answer.4) Remember WE? The brothers Kielberger had developed close ties with the Trudeau family through their WE charity and also with the family of then-finance minister Bill Morneau. Thus, one of Morneau's daughters worked for them, another spoke at WE events. Meanwhile, both Trudeau's mother and his brother received tens of thousands of dollars for speaking at WE events. Those sorts of ties.None of it was illegal. It was also perfectly natural; the glib Kielberger brand was a tight fit with the prime minister's own.However, when during the COVID-19 years the Trudeau Liberals awarded a sole-source contract to the WE Charity to run a $912 million Canada Student Grant program in support of COVID-19 relief, it looked a bit... cozy. Ultimately, the prime minister was cleared by the Ethics Commissioner, although Finance Minister Morneau repaid the cost of WE-sponsored travel. In an attempt to restore trust in the government, the Kielbergers also withdrew from the contract.Still, any time government ministers sail so close to the wind that the auditor general and the ethics commissioner must get involved, what is the poor old Canadian peasant to think? 5) The prime minister has in fact had several brushes with the ethics commissioner, the first being in 2017 when he accepted a vacation on the property of the Aga Khan, the latter being a registered lobbyist with the Government of Canada at the time. He needed a government official to tell him that was not on?6) Chinese election interference... and threats of violence to Canadian MPs... Nothing to see, here. The Trudeau Liberals could have called a full enquiry. But instead the prime minister picked an old family friend (former Governor General David Johnston) to fuss through the waste paper baskets. Special 'rapporteur' Johnston decided there could be something to it, but recommended against a full enquiry, then quit. Finally the prime minister did appoint a public enquiry, but tasked it with looking at interference from other hostile states also. Yes, of course I trust them not to just drag things out past the next election, so people have time to forget about it. Don't we all?7) The Trudeau Liberals ignore the Constitution. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, we are acutely aware that they knowingly pass illegal legislation, then cause economic damage by enforcing it. Bill C-69, the No Pipelines bill is a case in point.The list is alas illustrative, not exhaustive. We haven't space to get into the trust issues left over from federal COVID-19 leadership.But, here's the thing. Ms. Khalid is perhaps too young and inexperienced to remember that the ‘scam’ suffix is itself a throw-back to another trust-destroying Liberal idea.This was the so-called Ad-Scam. (properly, the Sponsorship Scandal.) In this racket, companies received government contracts on the understanding that the Liberal Party would get a kick back. Millions of dollars were involved and when it came to light, public disgust paved the way for the election of Stephen Harper in 2006, after 13 years of Liberal government.It was a very big deal.So is ArriveScam. It would appear that almost $60 million was directed to a little-known enterprise with good government connections, which then sub-contracted the work of contracting the hated ArriveCan app to others, while taking a handsome commission. Nice work if you can get it.But, when so many Canadians are struggling to make ends meet thanks to ruinous Liberal policies... Sorry Ma'am, massive cost overruns, rigged processes, double dipping and disappearing records kill trust.As Conservative MP Garnett Genuis put it, “Arrive-scam is impacting public trust because it is an earth-shattering scandal.” Exactly. Criminal charges may yet be laid.But even if they're not, seriously, would you buy a used car from any one of these people?
Like the boy who murdered his parents and then complained he was an orphan, Liberal MP Iqra Khalid just doesn’t get it.“When Conservative colleagues call it Arrive-scam instead of the ArriveCan app, it is impacting public trust,” she told the House of Commons public accounts committee. Well not really, madam. Your trust horse was out of the stable and over the gate a long time before Conservatives began saying that. In Ms. Khalid's case, it is of course professional amnesia. What you remember, you have to account for. But lest we all walk with her down that serene, grey lane of oblivion, here are seven ways this government has given Canadians every reason not to trust a word any of them say. 1) In 2015, a campaigning Justin Trudeau told Canadians that the economy would be fine, "budgets balance themselves."2) As prime minister, he would later dismiss an inconvenient question with this rhetorical wave of the hand, “You’ll forgive me if I don’t think about monetary policy.” The consequences of 1) and 2) are manifest in $9/lb butter and a mortgage-mashing 5% central bank rate. Canadians are going broke and turning to credit. On matters financial, there can be no trust. They're amateurs.3) PMO influence in the SNC-Lavalin affair... That lot, the reader will recall, involved undue influence upon the office of the federal attorney general, at that time occupied by Jody Wilson-Raybold. Ultimately however, it was about trying to get a Quebec company off the hook, after it had been accused of offering bribes. Can all large Canadian enterprises rely upon the gracious intervention of their Liberal government? To pose the question is to position the answer.4) Remember WE? The brothers Kielberger had developed close ties with the Trudeau family through their WE charity and also with the family of then-finance minister Bill Morneau. Thus, one of Morneau's daughters worked for them, another spoke at WE events. Meanwhile, both Trudeau's mother and his brother received tens of thousands of dollars for speaking at WE events. Those sorts of ties.None of it was illegal. It was also perfectly natural; the glib Kielberger brand was a tight fit with the prime minister's own.However, when during the COVID-19 years the Trudeau Liberals awarded a sole-source contract to the WE Charity to run a $912 million Canada Student Grant program in support of COVID-19 relief, it looked a bit... cozy. Ultimately, the prime minister was cleared by the Ethics Commissioner, although Finance Minister Morneau repaid the cost of WE-sponsored travel. In an attempt to restore trust in the government, the Kielbergers also withdrew from the contract.Still, any time government ministers sail so close to the wind that the auditor general and the ethics commissioner must get involved, what is the poor old Canadian peasant to think? 5) The prime minister has in fact had several brushes with the ethics commissioner, the first being in 2017 when he accepted a vacation on the property of the Aga Khan, the latter being a registered lobbyist with the Government of Canada at the time. He needed a government official to tell him that was not on?6) Chinese election interference... and threats of violence to Canadian MPs... Nothing to see, here. The Trudeau Liberals could have called a full enquiry. But instead the prime minister picked an old family friend (former Governor General David Johnston) to fuss through the waste paper baskets. Special 'rapporteur' Johnston decided there could be something to it, but recommended against a full enquiry, then quit. Finally the prime minister did appoint a public enquiry, but tasked it with looking at interference from other hostile states also. Yes, of course I trust them not to just drag things out past the next election, so people have time to forget about it. Don't we all?7) The Trudeau Liberals ignore the Constitution. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, we are acutely aware that they knowingly pass illegal legislation, then cause economic damage by enforcing it. Bill C-69, the No Pipelines bill is a case in point.The list is alas illustrative, not exhaustive. We haven't space to get into the trust issues left over from federal COVID-19 leadership.But, here's the thing. Ms. Khalid is perhaps too young and inexperienced to remember that the ‘scam’ suffix is itself a throw-back to another trust-destroying Liberal idea.This was the so-called Ad-Scam. (properly, the Sponsorship Scandal.) In this racket, companies received government contracts on the understanding that the Liberal Party would get a kick back. Millions of dollars were involved and when it came to light, public disgust paved the way for the election of Stephen Harper in 2006, after 13 years of Liberal government.It was a very big deal.So is ArriveScam. It would appear that almost $60 million was directed to a little-known enterprise with good government connections, which then sub-contracted the work of contracting the hated ArriveCan app to others, while taking a handsome commission. Nice work if you can get it.But, when so many Canadians are struggling to make ends meet thanks to ruinous Liberal policies... Sorry Ma'am, massive cost overruns, rigged processes, double dipping and disappearing records kill trust.As Conservative MP Garnett Genuis put it, “Arrive-scam is impacting public trust because it is an earth-shattering scandal.” Exactly. Criminal charges may yet be laid.But even if they're not, seriously, would you buy a used car from any one of these people?
