[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Barrister]

Spin?  you are the one making the claim that the political interference occurred and therefore Trudeau should resign.

I'm not claiming anything - that is how the story is being reported.  A claim to which Trudeau gave a nuanced denial.

[crazy canuck]

Spin?  you are the one making the claim that the political interference occurred and therefore Trudeau should resign.

I'm not claiming anything

  You just finished saying:

Wilson-Raybould, you might remember, gave a very strange statement at the time of the cabinet shuffle where she said the Justice Minister must be willing to "speak truth to power".  It seems clear this is what she was talking about.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/wilson-raybould-justice-veterans-1.4977782

Although I don't think it will happen, this is the kind of thing that by all rights should have Trudeau resign.  You can not have political interference in prosecutions, specially when it's motivated by very large political donations.

So when you said Trudeau should resign, what you really meant is it is far too early to make any determination about whether he should resign because we really have no idea what might have occurred beyond an anonymous allegation reported in a newspaper which has been denied?

[Barrister]

My exact words were "this is the kind of thing that... should have Trudeau resign".

I don't think there can be any question now that this allegation is what JWR was talking about in her letter upon being appointed to Veterans Affairs:

The Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada is somewhat distinct from other Cabinet Ministers because the role is a dual one. The Minister of Justice is the legal advisor to Cabinet. In this capacity, the Minister is concerned with the administration of justice, including policy in the areas of criminal law, family law, human rights law, and Indigenous justice. The role of the Attorney General of Canada carries with it unique responsibilities to uphold the rule of law and the administration of justice, and as such demands a measure of principled independence. It is a pillar of our democracy that our system of justice be free from even the perception of political interference and uphold the highest levels of public confidence. As such, it has always been my view that the Attorney General of Canada must be non-partisan, more transparent in the principles that are the basis of decisions, and, in this respect, always willing to speak truth to power. This is how I served throughout my tenure in that role.

At a time when the functioning of democracies around the globe is increasingly under strain, and democratic norms are in peril, the unique and independent aspects of the dual role of the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada are even more important. I know Canadians across the country expect such high standards to continue to be met – especially in the uncertain times in which we now live – and I expect this to continue.

A paean to the independence of the Attorney-General is all well and good - but why mention it when you've just been removed from the post?  And in particular where you refuse to comment on the removal in the first place?

Obviously, I wasn't in the room when JWR was allegedly being pressured.  I can't speak for the truth of the allegation.  But this ought to be independently investigated.  And if true, Trudeau ought to resign, if not outright charged criminally.

[crazy canuck]

Dude, she was talking about how she was running the first nations files and that she should be left alone to do it.

edit:In fact, what she was talking about is clearly set out in the following paragraphs of her statement.

With respect to Indigenous issues [you know, the thing she referenced in the paragraphs you quoted], as MOJAG, I have publicly expressed my opinions in various venues about the ongoing challenges in transforming what the Prime Minister has stated is the "most important" relationship, that between Canada and Indigenous peoples. One of my main motivations for seeking public office was to see the work of reconciliation accelerate and advance in real and tangible ways.

The work that must be done is well known. We have the solutions. Indigenous peoples have advocated and brought forward what must be done for decades. Countless Commissions, studies, reports, and analyses have reiterated the work we must do together to reconcile.

The foundation for moving forward is understanding that the dire social and economic realities that Indigenous peoples continue to face – including lack of clean drinking water, over representation in the criminal justice system, inadequate housing, high rates of poverty, and violence against Indigenous women and girls – are directly linked to legislative and policy regimes that have disempowered and divided Indigenous peoples, eroded their systems of governance, laws, and responsibilities, harmed their economies, and denied their basic rights and systems. Long overdue legislative and policy changes based on the recognition of title and rights, including historic treaties, are urgently needed, so that Indigenous peoples can accelerate and lead the work of re-building their Nations and governments, and a new climate of co-operative relations can emerge.

While our government has taken some very important steps, and hard work is being done, the necessary shifts have not yet been fully achieved. Rather, a number of the proposals that our government has been pursuing so far require substantial work in co-operation and collaboration with Indigenous peoples to reset the new foundations for this most important relationship.

As a Member of Cabinet, I will continue to be directly engaged in advocating for and advancing the fundamental shifts in relations with Indigenous peoples that are required and will continue to work with my colleagues and to ensure my voice is heard.

[Barrister]

Dude, she was talking about how she was running the first nations files and that she should be left alone to do it.

edit:In fact, what she was talking about is clearly set out in the following paragraphs of her statement.

The words "With respect to Indigenous issues," indicate to me she is pivoting to a different point.  Your reading may vary.

It would also be a quite remarkable coincidence for her to write such words two weeks before a major national paper accuses Trudeau of political interference with JWR in the SNC Lavelin case.

[crazy canuck]

Dude, she was talking about how she was running the first nations files and that she should be left alone to do it.

edit:In fact, what she was talking about is clearly set out in the following paragraphs of her statement.

The words "With respect to Indigenous issues," indicate to me she is pivoting to a different point.  Your reading may vary.

It would also be a quite remarkable coincidence for her to write such words two weeks before a major national paper accuses Trudeau of political interference with JWR in the SNC Lavelin case.

Read the paragraphs you quoted again.  She specifically referred to "Indigenous Justice".   Also you need to ignore all the other context that was going on at that time.  Did you even read the link I gave you to the document she posted after she learned she was going to be shuffled?   

[garbon]

My exact words were "this is the kind of thing that... should have Trudeau resign".

Of course, perhaps you should have started that with 'if true'.

[Barrister]

My exact words were "this is the kind of thing that... should have Trudeau resign".

Of course, perhaps you should have started that with 'if true'.

Rather than parsing my posts, why don't you tell me what you think of this news?

[Barrister]

BY the way CC, Paul Wells makes the exact same connection that I did to JWR's goodbye letter:

For a commission of inquiry into SNC Lavalin and the Prime Minister's Office
Paul Wells: What's alleged in today's Globe story is not just plausible, it points to bigger PMO problems. And it's the sort of thing that can destroy governments.
by Paul Wells Feb 7, 2019

Former jusitice minister Wilson-Raybould addressing the media after being shuffled to the Veterans Affairs portfolio. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld)

Today's most important reading was published on Jan. 14.

That's when Jody Wilson-Raybould, the UBC-educated lawyer from the We Wai Kai Nation, released a long, detailed memo explaining her accomplishments as Minister of Justice and Attorney General—on the very day Justin Trudeau demoted her to the Veterans Affairs portfolio.

"The role of the Attorney General of Canada carries with it unique responsibilities to uphold the rule of law and the administration of justice, and as such demands a measure of principled independence," she wrote. (I'm bolding the sections that seem particularly germane today.) "It is a pillar of our democracy that our system of justice be free from even the perception of political interference and uphold the highest levels of public confidence. As such, it has always been my view that the Attorney General of Canada must be non-partisan, more transparent in the principles that are the basis of decisions, and, in this respect, always willing to speak truth to power. This is how I served throughout my tenure in that role."

Look, that's just an odd thing to write if you're mostly interested in bragging about your legislative accomplishments.

I've seen a lot of attorneys general leave that post, and none felt the need to remind everyone that they had sought to avoid "even the perception of political interference." Absent any pressure to do things that might give the perception of political interference, it would seem as extraneous as writing, "I worked hard to keep the mail-room budget under control" or "I tried to maintain excellent posture during Question Period."

None of that proves a thing, of course. It's not a smoking gun. It's more of a... I don't know, a smoke-filled room. But it is damned interesting reading in the context of today's Globe and Mail line story. (It's paywalled. Pay up.) The story asserts, on the basis of unnamed sources, that Wilson-Raybould "came under heavy pressure to persuade the Public Prosecution Service of Canada" to cut a "deferred prosecution arrangement" with SNC-Lavalin Group Inc., the mammoth Montreal engineering and construction firm, to forestall a trial over corruption and fraud charges.

Now, here's the thing. SNC has been working hard to clean up its act, after several years as the worst kind of Quebec Inc. industrial juggernaut. Its former CEO Pierre Duhaime pled guilty only last week to, if I may paraphrase, spraying money in every direction to grease whatever wheels needed greasing. SNC's late clean-up was driven, not so much by a morning-after-Scrooge burst of sudden altruism, but more by the threat of never getting another federal contract again if the company continued to stink like a polecat. But who cares about motive, as long as the arc of the moral universe bends toward better corporate governance?

Now, here's the other thing: None of that matters. If—it's a huge if—the Prime Minister's Office leaned on the Attorney General to pressure the public prosecutor's office to conduct any case in any way, then it doesn't matter how nice the defendant is.

The intervention would be the infraction.

The Director of Public Prosecutions Act is clear: If the Attorney General inflects the work of the Public Prosecution Service of Canada in any way, for any reason, they must put it in writing in a directive that must be published in the Canada Gazette. There is no provision for cutting a nice guy some slack.

In fact, the course of events I've sketched above—battle-scarred pillar of Quebec Inc. wants fewer legal impediments to turn over a new leaf so it can continue scoring big global development contracts—makes the claims in the Globe story more plausible on their face. This is the sort of call one might conceivably make, if one did not care about what Jody Wilson-Raybould calls "a measure of principled independence."

Wilson-Raybould's on-the-record quotes in the Globe story are the furthest thing from denials. "That is between me and the government as the government's previous lawyer" is not the sort of thing you say when an allegation is false. You say it's false. I'm not saying Wilson-Raybould's response proves anything, but it leaves ample room for the thing to be true, as one possibility among many.

The PMO line, sent last night to the Globe and repeated this morning by the PM, is nearly identical and nearly meaningless. The PM didn't "direct" Wilson-Raybould "to draw any conclusions on this matter," the PMO said on Wednesday. Trudeau chimed in today, singing close harmony: neither he nor his staff  "directed" JWR "to make any particular decision in this matter." Thanks. That's great. You could drive a truck through that. Pressure wouldn't be "direction," and at no point would Wilson-Raybould need to "draw any conclusions" or "make any particular decision"—she would, if the allegations are true, be trying to inflect someone else's conclusions or decisions.

So where are we?

We have a minister of the crown—Wilson-Raybould is still that, as of today—reminding everyone that she had "unique responsibilities" against "even the perception of political appearance."

We have a public trail of increasing dissatisfaction at SNC with the way this case was going, leading up to October, four months ago.

We have Wilson-Raybould getting shuffled out of her job, to her obvious displeasure, at the next opportunity.

We have non-denials from the minister and artfully meaningless denials from the Prime Minister.

The allegations at hand are vastly more grave than the news that Stephen Harper's chief of staff, Nigel Wright, once wrote a personal cheque to make the Mike Duffy problem go away. This is about what Justin Trudeau's first hand-picked attorney general calls a "pillar of our democracy."

So let's cut to the chase. When Justin Trudeau's vacation with the Aga Khan started to become a problem, he spent a few weeks exploiting fine print and technicalities like a Philadelphia lawyer in hopes that everyone in Canada had lost their ability to parse transparent double-talk. There is no point in trying to do the same here.

In the absence of public denials from Jody Wilson-Raybould and her officials that anything like what is alleged in the Globe story ever happened—and I would say, even if she now makes any such denials—this needs a commission of inquiry. This is the sort of thing that, if proven, properly destroys governments.

One more question. Why on earth would any Liberal, knowing this, co-operate with the Globe's investigation or any other stories that might come to light in coming days?

I don't know who the Globe's sources are, and I've learned that attempts to guess another reporter's sources usually miss the mark by a mile. But let me make this general observation about the Liberal Party of Canada and Justin Trudeau's PMO. In recent months I have been increasingly critical of the PMO and especially of Trudeau's principal secretary, Gerald Butts. Frankly it hasn't been great fun. I don't get a kick out of being that specific in criticisms of a government. And typically, when you say "PM's staff," no matter who the PM is, what you really mean is "the PM." But the way this government hoses money around for show sickens me.

What I've noticed is that when I have been bluntly critical of Trudeau's PMO, no Liberal in Canada, outside the PMO, has reached out to criticize me, to gently try to correct perceptions, or otherwise to suggest I'm off-track. In fact, in a large number of cases, the response has been quite the opposite. I hear things like "Thank God" and "About time" and "I've been loving those columns."

That's all very anecdotal and personal and back-patting, so I'm sorry for all of it. But the conclusion I draw is: Justin Trudeau's senior PMO staff doesn't have a lot of fans, even among people who wish Trudeau well and whose personal futures are bound up with his. That may start to matter a lot now.

https://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/for-a-commission-of-inquiry-into-snc-lavalin-and-the-prime-ministers-office/

He also agrees with me that this is the kind of allegation that can bring down governments.

[crazy canuck]

BY the way CC, Paul Wells makes the exact same connection that I did to JWR's goodbye letter:

Actually you said it was clearly connected.  He did not make that claim.  He said something far more defensible.

None of that proves a thing, of course. It's not a smoking gun. It's more of a... I don't know, a smoke-filled room. But it is damned interesting reading in the context of today's Globe and Mail line story. (It's paywalled. Pay up.) The story asserts, on the basis of unnamed sources, that Wilson-Raybould "came under heavy pressure to persuade the Public Prosecution Service of Canada" to cut a "deferred prosecution arrangement" with SNC-Lavalin Group Inc., the mammoth Montreal engineering and construction firm, to forestall a trial over corruption and fraud charges.

What both he and you are missing is what actually happened right before the shuffle - I suppose it is a little inside baseball as few people will have noticed it - but I gave you the link so you no longer have that excuse. 

[Barrister]

So that's it?  It's just a remarkable co-incidence that JWR wrote a goodbye letter that was an ode to the independence of the AG 3 weeks before explosive allegations are made against the PMO about interfering in said co-incidence?

[crazy canuck]

So that's it?  It's just a remarkable co-incidence that JWR wrote a goodbye letter that was an ode to the independence of the AG 3 weeks before explosive allegations are made against the PMO about interfering in said co-incidence?

BB, she was upset that she was not being given the independence to re-create the legal relationship between first nations and the federal government the way she saw fit. Before you post again, do me a favour and at least read part of the link I gave you.  It was her reason for running for office.  It animated the whole of her actions and discretionary decisions.  She talked about it in all her speeches.  I don't know how you rationally ignore all of that and say she must have been talking about something else.

Now it may be.  Wells is right.  It makes for some interesting conjecture. But that is all it is atm.  Based on all the available evidence your theory is speculative (hopeful) at best.

One thing is for sure though.  There is an obvious feud going on between the Minister and the PM.  But, as I said, the source is well known and she has actually set out in writing what it is.

[PRC]

Looks like BB was on the mark with this... lot's of buzz in Ottawa over this story.

[crazy canuck]

Looks like BB was on the mark with this... lot's of buzz in Ottawa over this story.

That the Forest is being missed for the trees is not shocking particularly when there is a juicy scandal in the offing.   The mundane facts are.... well mundane and requires some detailed knowledge of the significance of the decisions she was making (and not making).  The interesting question is how the PM will choose to resolve this.  If he goes public over how she was running her ministry, he loses the aboriginal vote.  If he lets this potential scandal fester the damage is unknown but may well be forgotten by the time of the election.

Despite BB thinking my comments were Liberal party spin, I think it much more likely that the PM will make the political judgment to just ride it out and not have a public battle with his minister.  But we shall see.   

[Barrister]

So JWR resigns from cabinet today.

So here's the thing CC: if this "JWR was pressured to instruct PPSC to drop charges against SNC Lavelin" was a non-story, and the true reason had to do with JWR's intentions regarding first nations people, it would be easy enough to squash the story.  All the government has to do is waive privilege regarding SNC Lavelin and JWR will happily tell the press she was not pressured in any way.

But Trudeau hasn't done so.  Libs have gone into silent mode, hoping the story will go away (which it doesn't look like it is).

And by the way, the whole concept of non-prosecution agreements was only brought into law a year ago when such a provision was included in a government omnibus bill.  The speculation is (which has no hard evidence to support) was that it was included specifically for the benefit of SNC Lavelin.