Were the Release of the Auditor General’s Report Timely?
Patrick Faber
Was the timing of the Auditor General’s reports on the National Sports Council and Julian Cho Technical High School designed to undermine the Deputy Prime Minister whose portfolios as Minister of Education, Youth and Sports includes those two institutions as he heads to the leadership convention? It’s a question that was bluntly put to DPM Faber when he exited the Assembly Building this afternoon. While he was circumspect in responding to the Julian Cho matter which involves former principal turned Toledo West U.D.P. standard bearer Simon Coc, he chose not to respond to the timing of the audit reports’ release.
Patrick Faber, Minister of Education
“That is one that I have not really delved into in any great detail, but from what I have been advised, it is not the kind of thing that people purport it to be so I will reserve my comments and come back at a later time to speak about that. Evidently the people who wanted to raise it in the house this afternoon or this morning, they have an agenda and clearly our colleague from Toledo West clearly has an agenda because this is the man who of course is now his opponent and who is giving him a rocky time to be reelected. So he will try to stir the mud and make things seem as bad as they can be. But I can assure people that certainly from what I have been privy to it’s not that kind of mess that he would want you to believe and the opposition would want you to believe.”
Reporter
“Well, the auditor general’s report points to a fairly big mess at that school sir.”
Patrick Faber
“As I said, I will reserve my comments.”
Reporter
“Sir, would you speak about the timing of the release of these documents. They are audits that could have been tabled, we have had, I heard they were on the PM’s desk from late last year. Do you think that the timing is calculated to undermine you?”
Patrick Faber
“I won’t comment on that. Either way you would have a criticism for the PM, if he released it now or if he took another couple months to release it, then criticism would be why is he sitting on this?”
