Thank you very much, Chair. I appreciate that and I applaud your optimism about getting to reports.
If I recall correctly, when I left off I was trying to figure out, and think out loud, reasons the government would do what they've done. As a reminder, what they've done is unique in Canadian history in that we have never, ever had an Auditor General say to Parliament, “I do not have sufficient funds to carry out my work plan.” Those words have never been uttered before in Canadian history.
It's heartbreaking to see the minister try to make this about 2011, when 2011 at best is a talking point. At best, the argument the minister has is, “Wait a minute. You're accusing us of an awful thing, cutting the budget of the Auditor General. The Conservatives, when they were in power in 2011, were much worse.” That's their best argument, that “they did it too”, which, first of all, is not true and if I have any credibility in this place I'm willing to spend some of it, believe it or not, defending the Conservatives to the extent that what is going on now is completely apples and oranges from what went on in 2011. I know because, not only was I here, I was the chair of the committee.
It really is heartbreaking when you think about what's at stake here. This is not games. This is not bean counting. This is not boring accounting stuff that really doesn't matter to anybody or have any relevancy to the real world.
We're talking about, for instance, an audit that the Auditor General planned for next year on cybersecurity and has had to rip it out of the work plan because they don't have enough money. That has never happened in Canadian history.
For the minister to stand up and say that what this is really all about is whether the Liberals are as bad and evil from an auditing point of view as the Conservatives were, that's not the issue. Since I happen to have a bit of time, I thought what I might do is to help put this to bed, because again, it's heartbreaking, but we need to wrestle this false argument to the ground and get it out of the way so that we're actually talking about what matters, which is the Auditor General's work plan for next year, not what the previous government did eight years ago.
Since the Liberals seem to want to spend time there, I'll gladly spend some time explaining why I'm prepared to put my credibility on the line to say they are not comparable.
I'll say again how much I absolutely resent the minister, a federal minister of the Crown, standing up and attacking a member of the House. I stand here totally vulnerable and ready to be challenged, but I do not attack people personally. I didn't do it for the 15 years I was here, I didn't do it the 13 years I was at Queen's Park, and I didn't do it the five years I was sitting on city and regional councils in Hamilton. However, there I was, sitting listening to a minister attack me, and not only attack me on something that was made up out of thin air but attack me on my job, questioning my integrity on this committee when I was the chair.
Nothing matters more to me, other than my constituents, than the work of the Auditor General and proper oversight in this Parliament. That is where my passion is. That is where my heart is. It's really disappointing to see that the best the minister can do to defend against the indefensible is to attack another member of Parliament.
Quite frankly, I'm surprised because I know Joyce well. You and I have travelled with her, Chair. We have broken bread together. We've fought. We've had our arguments, but we've always kept it in the context of parliamentary collegiality, respect and an understanding that we're all here to do the same job. I thought that was the relationship that we had, so even on a personal level....
What it points to is the scarcity of a legitimate response. When you don't have an argument, you do two things. You get louder, which I know because I've done that—