Opposition parties accuse the Minister of the Economy, Pierre Fitzgibbon, of lacking transparency, because his government refuses to say which companies have benefited from the 1.5 billion dollars of public money entrusted to funds.
Monday, The newspaper revealed that Quebecers cannot know precisely where the $1.5 billion invested in funds have gone in recent years.
“Minister Fitzgibbon is a subscriber to breaches of ethics and transparency. He does not seem to understand that being a wheeler-dealer and a minister are not the same job. It is inconceivable that billions of public funds are distributed without knowing to whom”, denounced Haroun Bouazzi, responsible for Finance and Economy of Quebec solidaire (QS).
“Who benefits from our public money: is it foreign companies or companies in which Fitzgibbon has personal interests? We have the right to know”, he went so far as to ask himself.
Earlier in the day, Frédéric Beauchemin, responsible for Finance, Economy, and Innovation of the Liberal Party of Quebec (PLQ), had also denounced the situation.
The MNA for Marguerite-Bourgeoys, Frédéric Beauchemin.
“Blatant lack of #CAQ and IQ governance [Investissement Québec] who don’t even have or want comparables when evaluating IQ’s performance! The worst thing is all the power to spend without guidelines, without vision and without performance criteria,” he lamented, sharing the article on Twitter.
In the morning, the Minister of the Economy of the Legault government reacted by publishing a message.
“Funds supported by the govt[ernement] have robust governance tools that make government accountable[ernement], but also to all private investors. Either through lack of knowledge or bad faith, this kind of article insults the rigorous managers of these funds,” he retorted.
post of minister
This is not the first time that the ethics and transparency of the superminister of the Legault government have been singled out.
In June 2021, Pierre Fitzgibbon had to leave his post as minister while selling his interests in two companies. He had subsequently been able to resume his chair at the Economy on 1er following September.
In this photo posted on the Prime Minister’s Twitter account in January 2019, we see the Minister of the Economy, Pierre Fitzgibbon, a co-founder of White Star Éric Martineau-Fortin, Patricia Barbizet, an investor in White Star, Prime Minister Legault and his wife. Prime Minister François Legault claims to have had a dinner in particular with one of the co-founders of White Star and the Minister of the Economy, Pierre Fitzgibbon, in Paris. “Very happy to have participated in another economical dinner last night, notably with Patricia Barbizet from Temaris and Eric Martineau-Fortin from White Star Capital. Good discussions on the economy!” he says.
Taken from PM Legault’s Twitter
This followed an investigation by the Ethics Commissioner after The newspaper would have revealed that he had presented to François Legault the co-founder of a fund managed in a tax haven in which he was himself an investor and which placed him in contravention of the code of ethics of the National Assembly.