Summary:
NP View: Trudeau's SNC-Lavalin coverups are more disturbing than the alleged crimes - 15 Feb 19
It's a truism that it's not the crime but the coverup that typically does a government in. Maybe. But if this is a coverup, it is almost criminally incompetent
More than a full week after the SNC-Lavalin scandal erupted all over the Trudeau government, what’s most astonishing is how the federal Liberals haven’t even been able to yet settle on a coherent cover story — a “narrative,” as the political jargon would call it. The alleged acts are bad enough: pressuring former justice minister and attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould to quietly nudge prosecutors toward giving Quebec-based, Liberal-friendly SNC-Lavalin a break in an ongoing criminal prosecution for corruption charges, and then demoting her into a lesser portfolio when she refused. The manifest incompetence of the government’s response to the growing controversy is somehow more disturbing.
Let’s start with the whisper campaign that immediately began against Wilson-Raybould. A bevy of anonymous Liberal insiders have been spreading the word to any journalist who’ll listen that she was just a pain to work with. It was all about “Jody,” not about the government. She was difficult. Not a team player. The whispers, no doubt co-ordinated by the Prime Minister’s Office in a hamfisted attempt to control a disastrous story, resulted in a remarkable statement of support for Wilson-Raybould from another member of Trudeau’s cabinet this week: Jane Philpott, former minister of health and Indigenous services and now head of the Treasury Board. Her comments weren’t about the substance of the scandal per se; she tweeted a photo of her and Wilson-Raybould smiling, thanked her for having “taught me so much” and said she was “proud of the laws we worked on together” and that she knows “you will continue to serve Canadians.” But they were clearly an expression of support for Wilson-Raybould and, by clearly praising her work and public service, a vigorous rebuke to the stories being planted about Wilson-Raybould’s supposed selfishness.
Once the slagging of Wilson-Raybould had brought enough widespread criticism over their clearly sexist and probably racist tone (attacking a strong, highly accomplished female Aboriginal for being too full of herself — how classy), the prime minister finally condemned them. “There have been many comments published in the media in various reports, about the former attorney general, about Jody Wilson-Raybould, that are absolutely unacceptable,” he said on Friday. “The sexist comments, the racist comments that have been made by anonymous sources are unacceptable and I condemn them in the strongest possible terms. That is not what we need to be engaged in, in public discourse in Canada.”
It was an appropriate response. But how odd that it took a full six days after Liberal insiders had planted the slanderous stories for our supposedly feminist and progressive prime minister to finally say that.
This was far from the only misstep the prime minister had this week. On Monday, under questioning from reporters, Trudeau assured Canadians that the matter was overblown. The fact that Wilson-Raybould continued to serve in cabinet during the controversy, he said, showed that the public was overreacting, and that Wilson-Raybould was comfortable continuing to serve in his government.
Whoops.
She quit hours later, leaving Trudeau to gamely suggest the next day that he was disappointed she hadn’t spoken up if she’d felt uncomfortable. Ah, at least he made sure to keep blaming her and her alone.
Things did not improve for the Liberals as the week went on. The opposition tried to force a meaningful investigation through the Commons justice committee, but were effectively stonewalled by the Liberal majority, who declined to invite the key players to testify — most notably Wilson-Raybould herself and the prime minister’s principal secretary, Gerald Butts, who had privately discussed the SNC-Lavalin case with Wilson-Raybould. The committee may later elect to call either or both of those individuals, but only after closed-door meetings and only if at least one Liberal breaks with the majority to vote with the opposition. Canadians will learn as much about this federal Liberal scandal, in other words, as the federal Liberals choose. Chalk up another win for Canada’s Most Transparent Government Ever.
The disgraces didn’t stop there. Liberal MP Anthony Housefather, chair of the justice committee, gave a series of interviews where he suggested, apparently without having given the notion the slightest thought, that Wilson-Raybould was bounced from justice because she doesn’t speak French. That was a curious message to send the thousands of francophone Canadians who have honourably served in our country’s armed forces — including in our traditionally French-speaking units — by suggesting that Veterans Affairs is a portfolio suitable for dumping ministers whose French doesn’t quite pass muster. Housefather quickly retreated, saying his comments were speculation and he apologized for them. But then the prime minister later suggested that Wilson-Raybould wouldn’t have been moved if Scott Brison hadn’t recently resigned from politics, requiring a cabinet shuffle. While it’s true that Brison’s departure made a shuffle necessary, it was not necessary to specifically shuffle Wilson-Raybould; Finance Minister Bill Morneau and Environment Minister Catherine McKenna somehow managed to hang on to their jobs. (Amusingly, shortly after the prime minister’s comment, Brison’s husband tweeted, “It’s ok, I usually blame my husband for everything too.”)
It’s become a truism in politics that it’s not the crime but the coverup that typically does a government in. Maybe so. But if this is a coverup, it is almost criminally incompetent. The alleged offence is bad enough. The aftermath is embarrassing.
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