Emails Suggest Clement Misled Parliament over G8 Spending

At this point, Clement telling the truth on the G8 spending boondoggle would probably be more newsworthy.

The ever-diligent research staff of the NDP has uncovered yet another email suggesting cabinet minister Tony Clement was far more involved in the selection of projects in his riding for nearly $50 million in federal funding than he has let on. An email obtained through access-to-information requests shows that a staff member of Clement's riding office in the Muskokas asked municipal leaders to come up with projects that would get funding for beautification projects ahead of the 2010 G8 summit. The email suggested that "storefront renovations, roadwork, landscaping and general beautification, lighting, signage, anything that will enhance and is specific to the downtown area" would be made priorities. (We suppose the term "general beautification" could be extended to just about anything, though.) The email said the projects would be reviewed by FedNor, the federal economic development agency for northern Ontario of which Clement was then minister, which is almost the precise opposite of what Clement said in Parliament earlier this month. Clement told a House of Commons committee that he acted in a "coordinating role" and merely handed off a list of funding requests to John Baird's office, who was then infrastructure minister. Clement had also said that his office played no role in selecting which projects would get funding, and that it was the municipalities themselves that voluntarily withdrew the lone application of 33 that wasn't approved. Yet an email shows his office told the municipality of Gravenhurst not to submit that application as it would not be approved. At this rate, we're going to find out soon that the honourable minister's name isn't actually Anthony Clement.