Tories’ reputation on the line in stimulus audit

Auditor General Sheila Fraser will release her potentially explosive report on the government’s economic stimulus plan tomorrow.

It was Fraser’s audits of government spending in 2002 and 2004 that led to the sponsorship scandal and ultimately brought down the Liberal government. Opposition parties are hoping she’ll pull off a similar feat tomorrow when she releases her report on the Conservative government’s $22-billion Economic Action Plan (EAP), which was announced in the 2009 budget. The audit is intended to determine if money was awarded to any ineligible companies and could provide ammunition to attack the Conservatives’ reputation as good fiscal managers. Under the EAP, billions of dollars were distributed in a short amount of time, and only weeks after announcing it Finance Minister Jim Flaherty admitted there were likely going to be “some mistakes.”