The Liberals are asking the federal lobbying commissioner to investigate whether any of former MP Rahim Jaffer's business dealings have violated the Lobbying Act.

In the letter, sent Monday, Liberal MP Marlene Jennings asks Lobbying Commissioner Karen Shepherd to launch an investigation "into possible violations of the Lobbying Act involving GPG -- Green Power Generation Corp and its representatives."

Jaffer, husband of embattled Simcoe-Grey MP Helena Guergis, is a co-founder of the company, a consulting business that bills itself on its website as "Canada's premier green energy development firm."

According to an article published April 8 in the Toronto Star, Jaffer told a group of business associates during a meeting last September that he could help them obtain government funds for business projects. In particular, he allegedly said he had access to "a green fund."

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has denied that Jaffer has special access to the government or government funds.

Meanwhile, the opposition parties hammered away at the Conservative government in question period Monday, demanding to know what allegations led Harper to turf Guergis from cabinet and caucus and contact the RCMP and the Ethics Commissioner.

The 41-year-old Guergis stepped down from the Conservative cabinet on Friday, the same day that Harper announced that "serious allegations" had been raised about her conduct, which the RCMP and Ethics Commissioner will now investigate. Pending the outcome of the investigation, she will sit outside of caucus.

"On Friday, the prime minister fired a minister, kicked her out of caucus, called in the RCMP and the Ethics Commissioner and Canadians still don't know why," Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff said during question period. "There are quote-unquote serious allegations surrounding the conduct of this minister, but we still don't know what they are. When will the government tell Canadians the truth?"

Transport Minister John Baird was evasive in response to Ignatieff's queries, and would only admit that the allegations "came forward from a third party."

"Those allegations were forwarded to officials at the RCMP and with the Office of the

Ethics Commissioner here in Ottawa," Baird said. "The RCMP and the Ethics Commissioner will come to their own conclusions as is proper on this issue."

Baird would only confirm that the allegations "do not involve any minister, any MP, any senator, or for that matter any government employee."

Allegations under investigation

There are at least two specific issues that are under investigation, both involving Guergis and Jaffer, a 38-year-old former Strathcona-Edmonton MP and one-time chair of the Conservative caucus.

"First is that they have been asked to investigate allegations that Mr. Jaffer used Ms. Guergis' parliamentary office to conduct commercial business on behalf of his company," CTV's Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife told CTV News Channel late Monday morning.

"He also had an email address, an email account that she gave him which was a parliamentary account…spouses are allowed to have an email account like that but are not supposed to use it for private business."

The second, Fife said, is the allegation that Guergis accompanied Jaffer "to business meetings."

Earlier Monday, CTV News confirmed that Guergis and her husband had dined with Nazim Gillani last fall. Gillani is a Toronto businessman whose connections with Jaffer were detailed in the Toronto Star newspaper report from last week.

On his way home from the September meeting mentioned in the article, Jaffer was stopped by an OPP officer in Palgrave, Ont. Initially charged with cocaine possession and driving under the influence, he would eventually plead guilty to careless driving in March after the more serious charges were dropped.

The day after the September business meeting, Gillani sent out an email bragging that Jaffer had "opened up the Prime Minister's office to us." His spokesperson, Brian Kilgore, was quoted in Monday's the Globe and Mail newspaper saying that email was sent out to Jaffer and other associates.

When the details of that email were revealed in the Toronto Star last week, they prompted a stern reply from the Prime Minister's Office, which said Jaffer had no access to the Conservative government and any such claim to the contrary was "absurd."

CTV News has since confirmed that Jaffer and Guergis dined with Gillani at Sassafraz -- a trendy restaurant in Yorkville, a posh Toronto neighbourhood -- during the Toronto International Film Festival that same month.

"Nazim had dinner with Ms. Guergis and Rahim at Sassafraz. I was told by Nazim that they didn't talk business. It was a film festival, Yorkville kind of dinner," Kilgore said in an interview with CTV on Monday.

Kilgore also told CTV that Gillani never actually hired Jaffer to handle government relations and lobbying although discussions took place.

"Nothing actually happened with Jaffer from the talks. No money changed hands with Jaffer," he said.

According to his remarks in the Globe, Kilgore said the September dinner was the only time that Gillani had contact with Guergis.

"Naz confirms that he had had one social event with Helena. It was last year during the film festival. They had dinner -- a group of people," Kilgore told the Globe.

"That was the one and only time they met."

Prior to the remarks from Kilgore, Gillani had said little about the Toronto Star report.

On the weekend, Gillani released a statement saying he could not offer much comment on the "misleading and wrong allegations" presented in the Star report because of a legal matter he is involved in that is still before the courts.

Mounting problems

Guergis and her husband made headlines for months after a series of incidents brought them to public attention.

In February, Guergis was criticized by the public and her parliamentary peers after she allegedly threw a temper tantrum at the Charlottetown airport. Following that incident, members of her staff were revealed to have written letters to newspapers about their boss without identifying themselves as her employees.

A few days before the report in the Star, a Liberal MP asked the Ethics Commissioner to examine an $880,000 mortgage Guergis received for the full cost of a home she purchased in an upscale Ottawa neighbourhood. Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson said Monday she will not move forward with a review or an inquiry.

Jaffer's legal problems regarding his arrest in September also made headlines over the past few months.

Jaffer served as an Edmonton MP from June 1997 until losing his seat to NDP MP Linda Duncan in the October 2008 election.

With files from CTV's Ottawa Bureau Chief Robert Fife