THE CANADIAN PRESS -- OTTAWA - The Harper government has already been blasted by the auditor general for keeping Parliament in the dark about the $50-million G8 legacy fund.Now the Liberal party wants the auditor general to determine whether taxpayers got any value for the millions sprayed around cabinet minister Tony Clement's riding.
Liberal MP John McCallum wrote the auditor general Wednesday, asking that a "value for money" audit be done on the 32 infrastructure projects in Parry Sound-Muskoka, which wound up receiving about $45 million from the legacy fund.
The fund was supposed to help support last year's G8 summit, held in Ontario's cottage country, and provide a legacy for the region.
It was spent on gazebos, parks, public toilets and other beautification projects throughout the region. Many of the projects were hours away from the summit site in Huntsville, Ont., and were never seen or used by summit leaders or their entourages.
"A value for money audit would provide Canadians with an accurate picture of how each of the far-flung 32 projects, such as the gazebo in Sundridge, Ontario, and the washrooms in Baysville, Ontario, achieved the intended purpose of supporting the G8 summit ... which in some cases was up to 100 kilometres away," McCallum said in a letter to acting auditor general John Wiersema.
"In my view, it seems obvious that the 32 G8 legacy projects had little, if anything, to do with meeting any of the objectives."
Opposition parties have long maintained the money was a political "slush fund" that Clement was allowed to dispense in his riding as he saw fit.
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Source: Huffington
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