QUESTION PERIOD — Prime Minister’s Office
Comments of Prime Minister
April 10, 2019
Honourable senators, my question for the government leader concerns comments the Prime Minister made to reporters yesterday. He said:
You can’t be lying to Canadians. . . . there are consequences, short term and long term, when politicians twist the truth. . . .
With respect to SNC-Lavalin, the Prime Minister said Ms. Wilson-Raybould did not come to him directly with her concerns. However, he admitted in the other place last week that she did just that in a meeting on September 17.
Beyond the current SNC-Lavalin scandal, Liberal election promises on home mail delivery, electoral reform, inclusion of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, banning marketing and advertising of junk food to children and the so-called “modest” deficits have all been discarded by the Prime Minister and his government.
Senator Harder, how should Canadians view all these incidents where the Prime Minister has said or promised one thing and then said or done the opposite?
Again, I thank the honourable senator for his question. Let me repeat, as I did yesterday to a question similarly placed, that it is the view of the government — certainly the Prime Minister — that false and defamatory comments ought not go unheeded and unaddressed. That is the basis on which he took the action that he has.
