Poor Pamela Wallin – that’s the story she would have us believe, based on her speech in her defence in the Senate today. Only unlike Mike Duffy, who was scorching the earth and taking the Prime Minister down with him, Wallin got personal with other Senators, naming Marjory LeBreton and Carolyn Stewart-Olsen as the architects of some kind of conspiracy against her, and gave the defence that the other Senators resented her because she was an “activist senator” – a bogus and self-aggrandising construct that presupposes that no other senator is also activist. Contrary to the myth of people who do no work and nap all day, most Senators are active in their activism around one cause or another. For most, it’s why they got appointed in the first place. In fact, most of their activism and causes are far more focused than Wallin’s, whose “activism” seemed to be largely about supporting the troops and being a motivational speaker on demand. For her part, LeBreton completely refuted Wallin’s accusations of conspiracy and of the campaign of leaks designed to “discredit” Wallin, and further added that she wasn’t responsible for Wallin’s expense claims. Because yes, those are still at the heart of the issue, and Wallin isn’t exactly offering contrition for anything on her part.
Tag Archives: Nigel Wright
QP: The aftershocks of Duffy’s bombshell
With Parliament Hill still reeling from last night’s ClusterDuff bombshell, and all leaders were in the House, waiting for the big show. It got started with Mulcair asking if Harper threatened Duffy with expulsion on February 13th. Harper said that he didn’t threaten him with expulsion, but he did think the expenses were inappropriate and ordered them repaid or he’d be thrown out of caucus. Mulcair asked if Harper had said that it wasn’t about the rules, but the perception. Harper denied saying that, and gave another rousing defence of following the rules made before the entire expenses. Mulcair pushed, and asked if Wright was present for that discussion. Harper, getting punchy, said that it was a statement before the entire caucus, and did not order Wright to write the cheque, and because that action was wrong, Wright was no longer in his office. When Mulcair asked if Ray Novak was party to those discussions, Harper insisted that Novak was not one of the people that Wright named as being involved, and he obviously wasn’t involved as he never would have approved it. Justin Trudeau began by pointing out that leaders take responsibility, and named the people that Harper hired or appointed at the centre of the scandal. Harper rejected the premise, and hit back at Duffy, saying that since Duffy felt he hadn’t done anything wrong, it was why he was no longer in caucus. Trudeau demanded that Harper answer questions under oath around the affair, but Harper hit back, saying that Trudeau was too willing to let Senator Harb back into caucus (which is not exactly true).
Roundup: Duffy’s scorched earth policy
Well, that was…interesting. After Senator Carignan, the leader of the government in the Senate, spent over an hour laying out the case against Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau, and after a couple of other Senators from all sides expressed their reservations about this move and the lack of due process – let alone the setting of dubious precedents – the real bombshell dropped. Senator Duffy got up to speak to his defence, and he took the scorched earth approach, crying that he didn’t want to go along with this conspiracy “foisted” upon him, that he should have said no, that his livelihood was threatened, and that it all led back to Harper and the Senate leadership. If anything, it made it harder for Harper’s version of events to stand up to scrutiny, which the NDP spent the evening gleefully putting press release after press release about. It’s also going to make QP later today to be quite the show. Of course, what Duffy neglected to mention was his own wrongdoing. He protested that he hadn’t done anything wrong – which is not the case. Both the Deloitte audit and the subsequent RCMP investigation have shown that his residence is not, in fact, PEI, and that’s a constitutional requirement, no matter what LeBreton or Wright told him. A retired constitutional law professor from PEI says that Duffy never actually met the residency criteria, given that when the constitution says a Senator “shall be a resident of the province for which he is appointed,” and that shall means “must” in legal terms, Duffy’s qualification never was valid to begin with, which is how this whole sordid affair got started in the first place. While Duffy may be trying to play the victim, he is still under investigation, no matter that the cover-up has now become worse than the alleged crimes. The same with Brazeau, though there wasn’t really much cover-up there. We shouldn’t forget that, no matter the speeches they gave.
QP: The long-awaited showdown
As the minutes counted down before Question Period, Thomas Mulcair, without his usual mini-lectern on his desk, glared across the aisle, while Stephen Harper casually flipped through a briefing binder, and the Members’ Statements were going on around them. At the appointed hour, the Speaker called for Oral Questions, and the rumble began. Mulcair asked if the prime minister regretted any of his own actions in the ClusterDuff affair. Harper got up and said that he expected people to follow the rules, and if mistakes are made then they would have consequences. Mulcair asked if Harper was telling the truth on June 5th when he said that nobody else knew of the deal between Wright and Duffy. Harper said that Wright took full responsibility, and that he accepted that. Mulcair tried again, but got some economic boosterism in reply. Mulcair pushed, asking if anyone had even asked whether they knew the payment was wrong. Harper tried to veer the topic back to the economy, and when Mulcair, somewhat rhetorically asked if Canadians could trust Harper to tell the truth, but Harper tried to further insinuate that the NDP were against CETA, and that their position kept changing. For the Liberals, Justin Trudeau got up and threw a curve-ball, congratulating Harper and everyone who worked hard to get the EU trade agreement, and asked when the full text would be available. Harper accepted the plaudits, and said more details would be forthcoming. Trudeau segued to the fact that leaders took responsibility for when things when wrong as well as when things went right, and that he was responsible for the various appointments at the centre of the ClusterDuff affair. Harper responded that he was clear about people paying the price when rules aren’t followed.
Roundup: Duffy’s lawyer throws some bombs
It was quite the noon hour revelation, as embattled Senator Mike Duffy’s lawyer took the stage of the Charles Lynch Press Theatre, and lobbed grenades at the PMO on Duffy’s behalf – careful grenades that were all hearsay and accusation with no paper documents to back anything up. He alleged that Duffy didn’t want to have anything to do with the $90,000 repayment – not only because he didn’t think he owed anything as he had his residency cleared with the Senate leadership and Nigel Wright, but that when he was made to repay it, he pleaded that he wasn’t a wealthy man, and that Wright paid it to make the problem go away, and that if he didn’t cooperate, then they would use his residency issue to remove him from the Senate. Because you know, Duffy is the victim in all of this. It was also alleged that PMO instructed Duffy not to cooperate with auditors, and that they fed him media lines to deal with everything. Senator David Tkachuk, who then-chaired the Internal Economy Committee, denies ever threatening Duffy, especially with expulsion, which would seem to put the onus on Duffy and his lawyer to put up and reveal the documents.
QP: Yet another ClusterDuff explosion
Less than two hours before QP got underway, embattled Senator Mike Duffy’s lawyer called a press conference and lobbed a few grenades into the laps of the government, alleging a great many things about how much the PMO was involved in the affairs with Duffy. Thomas Mulcair, however, was not in the House, as he was off giving a speech to a labour group in Quebec City. In his absence, Megan Leslie led off for the NDP, asking about those very allegations dropped by Duffy’s lawyer. Harper replied that they expected all parliamentarians to follow both the letter and the spirit of the law and if they didn’t, then they would suffer the consequences. While he was up, pointed to the somewhat fictitious opposition of the NDP to the EU free trade agreement and said that they were only asking questions like those about Duffy because they couldn’t do so on the big issues. Leslie kept at it, but Harper kept insisting that they had cooperated with investigators. Eventually, Paul Calandra took over answering for Harper, and touted the reforms to the Senate that they’ve proposed (not that they would have done anything about this issue). For the Liberals, Ralph Goodale got up and named the names in the PMO that the lawyer dropped. Harper got up and insisted that he answered all of these questions before, and he was focused on the biggest trade deal in a generation.
QP: Back to form
The first Question Period of the new session, and the Prime Minister was absent, jetting off to Brussels to conclude the trade agreement with the EU. After a round of Members’ Statements which were pretty much bog standard for the rhetorical levels we’ve come to expect in the current parliament, Thomas Mulcair returned to true form — reading from a mini-lectern. But rather than beginning with questions on the ClusterDuff, Mulcair started with a calm and controlled question on missing and murdered Aboriginal women. Peter MacKay, acting as the designated back-up PM du jour, assured him that they were taking the measures seriously. Mulcair then turned to the issue of “corruption” in the prime minister’s office, and accused him of hiding on the other side of the Atlantic. Pierre Poilivre responded and extolled the virtues of the Canada-EU trade deal. After another round of the same, Mulcair turned to the closure of Veterans Affairs service centres, for which Parm Gill insisted that they drive to meet veterans at a place of their choosing rather than forcing them to drive to designated locations. Mulcair then moved onto the issue of cyberbullying, and demanded that they pass Robert Chisholm’s bill at all states unanimously. (Proof right there as to why we need the Senate to do the scrutiny that MPs seem to want to avoid). MacKay assured him that a bill would come in due course. For his turn, Justin Trudeau asked why there was no mention of transparency or accountability in the Throne Speech. Poilievre assured him that once the Supreme Court provided then with a “legal reference manual,” they would reform the Senate. Trudeau then pointed out the government’s abysmal economic record, which Poilievre laughed off. For his last question, Trudeau asked why the government would not put in place a new system for MPs’ expenses reporting. John Duncan said that until a new system was agreed to, Conservative MPs would do it on their own accord.
Roundup: Flaherty’s EI premium freeze
Jim Flaherty announced a “good news” economic measure of freezing EI premiums for the next three years – you know, like the Liberals have been hounding him to do for the past couple of years. Only, to be clever, the Liberals were calling them “job-killing payroll taxes” either, and despite the freeze, there will still be some rate increases. It also makes one wonder about the utility of the arm’s length board set up to advise on things like rates if the government continues to undermine them and set the rates anyway. Aaron Wherry notes that this was the subject of one of Justin Trudeau’s “crowd-sourced” questions during QP in the spring. When you crunch the numbers, however, the freeze isn’t worth all that much – about $24 per year for the average person, and $340 for the average business.
Roundup: Senators in defence of their institution
Liberal Senate leader James Cowan penned an op-ed in yesterday’s Chronicle Herald about the work that the Senate does, and the value that it provides to the legislative process in Canada. And it was an excellent read, which I’d highly recommend – it was about time that a senator was so eloquent in the defence of the institution. I do find it curious that so far it seems to be Liberal senators who are doing a disproportionate share of that defence – even though I know plenty of Conservative senators who feel the institution should be left alone (financial controls tightened, of course). Unfortunately, most of the Conservative Senate caucus, if they do speak up, are only sticking to the absurd and disingenuous party line of “the Senate must change or be abolished,” as though any of the proposed reforms would either do anything about the alleged graft of a small number (it wouldn’t), were constitutional (they aren’t), or that they could measurably be said to actually improve the institution (highly debateable, but when you look at the totality of the Senate and its work, the proposed reforms would only serve to create partisan gridlock with 105 new backbenchers for party leaders to control). I have no doubt that they want to keep their heads down because they don’t want to be accused of trying to protect their entitlements, but they’re liable to find that if they don’t speak up for the institution, that they will be the unwitting agents of their own demise, which would be an absolute shame.
Roundup: Bringing back the tough-on-crime narrative
Because he needs to change the channel of the national conversation, Stephen Harper announced yesterday that one of his government’s priorities coming back in the fall will be a bill to toughen the sentences for child sex offenders. Because nothing says “tough on crime!” like increasing sentences. Harper also blasted Justin Trudeau for putting pot ahead of the economy – as though it were an either/or proposition, or that there were no economic consequences from legalising marijuana, or the resources that it would free up from enforcing the existing laws in a rather futile way. Harper also seems to think that Trudeau is encouraging youth to use marijuana, when in fact Trudeau has said exactly the opposite – that legalising and regulating it will help to keep it out of the hands of children. But hey, since when to sound bites need to be factually accurate? Harper did say that he would take a look at the Chiefs of Police’s report recommending that marijuana possession be made a ticketable offence rather than one meriting a criminal conviction, so baby steps – right?