Tempers flared inside the ORNGE committee hearings Tuesday as Health Minister Deb Matthews returned to the stand and called Chris Mazza’s testimony “pure nonsense.”

Matthews told an all-party hearing investigating the troubled provincial air ambulance service that claims by former ORNGE CEO Mazza that she repeatedly shunned his requests to meet with her as entirely false.

And after 600 pages of ORNGE testimony and listening to 54 witnesses by the end of the week, it is time for the committee to stop pointing blame and come up with recommendations on how to fix the system, Matthews added.

After four months of testimony, the probe has heard of Mazza’s reign at the agency since 2005, of the hiring of his water-ski instructor girlfriend who rose up the corporate ladder to become an associate vice president, and of the bizarre web of for-profit spin-off companies created by ORNGE. There are also questionable business dealings and contracts now being investigated by the Ontario Provincial Police.

Progressive Conservative MPP Frank Klees, who has made it his mission to investigate ORNGE, dropped a bomb in committee by releasing a letter from a health ministry senior staffer warning of serious financial problems at the agency.

The memo was from Malcom Bates, director of the ministry’s emergency health services branch, dated June 29, 2011.

The letter warns senior ministry staff that the government may have to step in and assume massing debt at ORNGE. It also mentions a $4.3 million loan receivable where “taxpayer dollars” have been lent out and it discusses the jump in ORNGE’s capital assets. They rose from $96.4 million to $264 million and cite “assets under construction” as the reason for the rise.

“We do not have additional information on this — we assume this is planes that are not completed but are in progress,” the letter stated.

Matthews told the committee she has never seen Bates letter before.

Klees retorted back that he found it “passing strange” she had not seen it and questioned why.

“What are you hiding?” he questioned her.

Often, Liberal committee members jumped in to stop Klees as he questioned Matthews.

The health minister said Klees has a history of dropping information bombs that turn out to be untrue.

“On behalf of the frontline staff, the paramedics, pilots, the engineers, all 600 staff — would you stop running down the organization and be part of the solution? I am hungry for this committee to finish its work and write its report … I’d like the recommendations of the committee,” she said.

Klees shouted back his recommendations would be, “first of all start with your resignation.”

In the opposition dominated committee, NDP MPP’s France Gelinas and Jagmeet Singh both chastised Matthews for letting ORNGE “run amok” without proper oversight.

Gelinas pointed out back in 2010 then NDP MPP Howard Hampton asked 47 questions concerning ORNGE and Mazza’s salary in a committee meeting but his questions were completely ignored by government staffers.

“The warning signs were coming from all sides but you didn’t act until the story hit the front page of the paper,” she said, referring to the Toronto Star.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

The Star was the first media outlet to reveal a litany of problems at the $150 million a year publicly funded air service, including the $1.4 million hidden salary of founder Mazza.

Gelinas also asked if taxpayers would be on the hook for the $1.8 million that helicopter firm AgustaWestland now wants back from ORNGE, as was disclosed in Tuesday’s Star.

Matthews replied that since the firm Agusta wants the money from is an ORNGE spin-off that is now bankrupt, taxpayers don’t have to worry about it.