The Council of Canadians was in newspapers across the country this week criticizing the Harper government’s $2 million expenditure on a fake lake in the convention centre where the G20 summit is taking place. We dubbed it Harper’s Folly.
We were also in both the lead story on the CTV National News and on the Global National News.
Industry Minister Tony Clement responded by saying, “Calm down. It is a reflecting pool.” Then Conservative MP Dean Del Mastro said, “It’s a reasonable investment. It’s not a lot of money.”
Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon added, “We are receiving a large number of heads of government, of leaders from around the world. We are using this opportunity to be able to showcase Canada. We are telling Canada’s story. We are proud of what we have done. We are proud of what we are doing. We are proud of being able to promote Canada abroad, and we will continue to do it with this amount of money.”
Now Prime Minister Stephen Harper is saying, “These aren’t expenditures for a fake lake but rather for a pavilion to promote Canadian tourism. Thousands of people will be our guests from all over the world and we intend to promote tourism.”
To join our call to scrap the summits, go to http://canadians.org/campaignblog/?p=3761.
