Categories for Feature

#LavScam latest: did PMO have direct contact with prosecutors in the SNC-Lavalin trial?

— 03.25.2019 09:57 AM

That’s what the Globe and Mail is suggesting in another shocker this morning. I have wondered the same thing.

Huge reporting by Fife and Team. And, if true, this moves things closer to obstruction of justice. Big time.

The Prime Minister’s Office will neither confirm nor deny the assertion by former attorney-general Jody Wilson-Raybould that senior advisers to Justin Trudeau had inside knowledge of discussions within the independent Public Prosecution Service about the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin.

Ms. Wilson-Raybould has alleged that the Prime Minister’s Office [PMO] told her chief of staff about an apparent internal dispute between director of public prosecutions Kathleen Roussel and one of the federal prosecutors handling the SNC-Lavalin bribery and fraud prosecution.

In testimony before the Commons justice committee last month, Ms. Wilson-Raybould described a Sept. 16, 2018, conversation between her then-chief of staff, Jessica Prince, and the Prime Minister’s Quebec adviser, Mathieu Bouchard, and senior adviser Elder Marques about negotiating an out-of-court settlement with SNC-Lavalin.

Ms. Wilson-Raybould says she plans to provide follow-up written testimony this week to the committee to show there was high-level political interference in the SNC-Lavalin matter.


Comments (8)

Violate the law – because it’s 2019! (updated)

— 03.21.2019 08:43 PM

Hate to sound like a guy who teaches at a law school and all that, but I am and I do.  And so, Judy Sgro, John McKay, Susan Delacourt and Trudeau patronage recipient Bob Rae et al.: stay in your lane, please.  Violating a cabinet oath is a serious offence.  Violating solicitor-client privilege will get a lawyer disbarred, too.

Get with it, folks.  Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott have both said they want to talk, and they have things to say.

Justin Trudeau, our Feminist-in-Chief, just won’t let them.

UPDATE: My smart lawyer friend Ed Prutschi suggests Sgro, McKay, Rae et al. may be counselling an indictable offence, here.


Comments (21)

The Jane Philpott interview: this is extraordinary

— 03.21.2019 08:54 AM

Paul Wells and Maclean’s have got the first interview with Jane Philpott – former Minister of Health, former Treasury Board President, former Minister of Indigenous Services – and it is incredible.

From the very first time I met Jane, and spoke at her riding association many years ago, I believed her to be principled and brilliant.  And the kind of person we need in public life.

Reading some of the snippets below, I am reminded of how principled and brilliant she truly is.  And I convinced, more than ever, that the true is like water.

It will find a way out.

**

Q: When you left cabinet, did you have a strategic goal in mind? What was the point of resigning?

A: I resigned because I could not maintain solidarity with cabinet on the specific issue of the management of the SNC-Lavalin issue. I felt that there was evidence of an attempt to politically interfere with the justice system in its work on the criminal trial that has been described by some as the most important and serious prosecution of corporate corruption in modern Canadian history.

A: No. There’s much more to the story that should be told.

Q: What sort of stuff?

A: I believe the former attorney general has further points to make. I believe that I have further issues of concern that I’m not free to share. There was a reference by Gerry Butts in his testimony of the fact that I spoke to the Prime Minister on January the 6th about SNC-Lavalin’s desire to have a DPA [deferred prosecution agreement]. This was more than a month before the story became public. And I ordinarily would have not been allowed to share that information. But of course it’s already on the public record from the Justice Committee. I think Canadians might want to know why I would have raised that with the Prime Minister a month before the public knew about it. Why would I have felt that there was a reason why former Minister Wilson-Raybould should not be shuffled?

Q: In what forum would you like to discuss all of this?

A: My sense is that Canadians would like to know the whole story. I believe we actually owe it to Canadians as politicians to ensure that they have the truth. They need to have confidence in the very basic constitutional principle of the independence of the justice system.

Q: Mr. Butts said, essentially, ‘Come on, this doesn’t rise to the level of harassment, or bugging, or even sustained engagement. It’s 20 interactions over four months. It’s two phone calls and two meetings per month.’

A: The constitutional principle of the independence of the justice system is such that the attorney general of our country should not be subjected to political interference in any way. Whether there is one attempt to interfere or whether there are 20 attempts to interfere, that crosses ethical and constitutional lines.

Q: Now there’s an Ethics Commissioner investigation. Michael Wernick seemed to have a lot of confidence in the Ethics Commissioner. Do you think that can capture everything that needs capturing?

A: My sense is that they will not have the appropriate tools to be able to get at all of this.

Q: What’s missing?

A: If nothing wrong took place, then why don’t we waive privilege on the whole issue and let those who have something to say on it speak their minds and share their stories?

Q: The Finance Minister [Bill Morneau] said your resignation from cabinet was an expression of personal friendship with Jody Wilson-Raybould. What do you make of that?

A: I think that’s an insult.

Q: How so?

A: I don’t make decisions on any policy — and definitely not on a matter of principle — based on friendship. I made the very difficult decision to step down because my conscience demanded it.

 


Comments (39)

Haters share one thing

— 03.21.2019 05:15 AM

…they love guns. White supremacists, neo-Nazis, homophobes, Holocaust deniers, Islamophobes, committed racists all share one thing: they are gun nuts. Back when the Heritage Front was the largest and most active hate group on the planet, they made holding a valid Canadian Firearms Acquisition Certificate a condition of membership.

So, what New Zealand has done here, in less than a week, is a big and positive step. The gun nuts will say that it won’t eliminate illegal guns, and they’re right, but they’re fundamentally dishonest, too. They know it will mean fewer assault weapons – weapons that are simply designed to hunt humans – getting into the wrong hands.

So, kudos, Kiwis. Your Prime Minister is pretty amazing, I’d say.

(CNN) — All military-style semi-automatic weapons, assault rifles and high-capacity magazines will be banned in New Zealand following the mass shootings at two Christchurch mosques that killed 50 people, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced on Thursday.

“On 15 March our history changed forever. Now our laws will too. We are announcing action today on behalf of all New Zealanders to strengthen our gun laws and make our country a safer place,” Ardern said at a press conference in the capital Wellington.

The announcement came after the country’s cabinet agreed to overhaul the law and ban military-style semi-automatics and assault rifles 72 hours after the Christchurch attacks. 

“Every semi-automatic weapon used in the terror attack on Friday will be banned,” Ardern continued, adding that she hoped the law would be in place by April 11. “This legislation will be drafted and introduced in urgency.”


Comments (17)

Because it’s 2019

— 03.20.2019 02:00 PM

Good on her. She’s got guts and integrity to spare.

We haven’t heard the last from Celina.

Whitby, Ont. MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes has quit the Liberal caucus and will sit as an independent.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the decision after the weekly caucus meeting.

“I have just been notified by my office that Celina Caesar-Chavannes has decided to sit as an independent. I want to thank her for her service to the Liberal Party and to her constituents, and wish her the best in her continued service to her constituents,” he said.

Caesar-Chavannes already had announced she will not seek re-election in the October election.

She told the Globe and Mail that when she first told Trudeau about her plan not to run, he became hostile towards her.

“He was yelling. He was yelling that I didn’t appreciate him, that he’d given me so much,” Caesar-Chavannes told the newspaper.

The Prime Minister’s Office insisted that Trudeau displayed “absolutely no hostility” in the exchange.


Comments (10)

One way Canada can fight hate, right away

— 03.17.2019 04:04 PM

Talk is cheap.

If the Trudeau government is serious about stopping the spread of hate, here’s something they can do this week.

Will they? (Oh, and one Minister was looking at ways to bring back a version of section 13. Guess who she was?)


Comments (4)

#LavScam legal: what it means now that PMO has lawyered up

— 03.16.2019 09:51 AM

The Globe and Mail has reported that Justin Trudeau and senior PMO staff have now retained independent legal counsel in #LavScam. I’ve helped organizations through legal/comms crises many times. 

I can tell you this is what this latest revelation means:

• their ability to communicate openly about the file comes to an abrupt end

• they now can’t take notes, send or receive email, etc. without disclosing them to the police, Ethics Commissioner, et al. 

• they can’t delete past records without attracting more legal peril

• their lawyers are telling them, over and over, that they should not discuss the case with anyone, including their bosses

• their lawyers are reviewing, in advance, everything they hope to say about #LavScam – which necessarily slows down their responses in what is a fast-moving scandal 

• the Opposition and the media are going to be watching the legal bills like hawks – and publicizing every penny (which the relevant law firms don’t ever like, and which sometimes leads to withdrawal)

• they are getting their legal bills paid by the taxpayer – but there’s usually a dollar limit, and the representation won’t cover wrongdoing done outside their government roles (ie., LPC)

• their legal bills will get very big very fast – which will inevitably create a whole new layer of scandal 

• they may need to hire non-legal representation – comms counsel, for instance – and that inevitably means yet more costs which leads to yet more scandal 

• they may need to start paying for additional legal representation out of their own pockets – which inevitably leads to them going home and their spouse saying: “We didn’t sign on for this. This is bankrupting us. You need to quit.”

And so on, and so on. 

None of this would have happened if any of them had paid heed to the law – for instance, using “jobs” as an excuse to enter into a Deferred Prosecution Agreement is expressly prohibited in bribery cases (as this is) and Article Five of the OECD Anti-Bribery Working Group Convention (which Canada has signed). 

They didn’t talk to any lawyers at the start. Because of that, they’re now going to be talking to lawyers all the time. 

To, you know, keep themselves out of jail. 


Comments (33)

Globe: Trudeau, PMO staff hire outside lawyers in case RCMP probes #LavScam

— 03.15.2019 05:30 PM

Wow.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and senior officials in his office have retained outside legal counsel in case of an RCMP investigation into allegations of political interference in the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin Group.

Mr. Trudeau’s communications director, Cameron Ahmad, told The Globe and Mail on Friday that Treasury Board rules allow for hiring of outside counsel when government officials are either sued, threatened with a suit, charged with an offence or under threat of being named in a legal action.

“As per the Treasury Board Policy on Legal Assistance and Indemnification, counsel has been retained to advise on the matter in question,” Mr. Ahmad said in an e-mail.

Mr. Ahmad would not provide further details or reveal the names of the law firms retained by Mr. Trudeau and staff in the Prime Minister’s Office, in response to a formal request last month for an RCMP investigation from Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer.

A senior government official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter, said an outside law firm has been hired to represent Mr. Trudeau, and another law firm will handle staff in the Prime Minister’s Office.

The second law firm will act on behalf of Mr. Trudeau’s chief of staff, Katie Telford, Quebec adviser Mathieu Bouchard and senior adviser Elder Marques, the official said.


Comments (15)