Tabled as evidence at Duffy’s criminal trial Wednesday, the emails show Harper’s staff were extremely sensitive to whether all senators were qualified to represent the province or territory from which they are appointed.
They also show that Harper believed owning property in a province – not necessarily being resident there – was enough for someone to represent that province in the upper chamber. The assertion is sure to stoke fresh questions about whether Duffy and other Harper appointees were qualified to sit in the Senate in the first place.
Dating from February to May 2013, the hundreds of pages of emails were compiled by Harper’s former chief of staff, Nigel Wright. He gathered them following questions about his decision to help Duffy pay back $90,000 in questionable expense claims. The emails ultimately ended up with the RCMP.
The emails largely focus on efforts within the Prime Minister’s Office to make the Senate expenses scandal go away. Aside from cutting a deal with Duffy, Wright and his team ordered senators not to talk publicly without direction, and tried to curb further Senate investigations into irregular spending and expense claims.
Testifying in court, where Duffy is facing 31 charges, Wright said the PMO was concerned about the spending scandal because of its potential impact on the Conservative party’s image and reputation. Yet many of the emails also touch upon the issue of residency.
The Constitution states that senators must be “resident” in the province for which they are appointed, as well as own property worth at least $4,000. What constitutes residency, however, has been a matter of debate since questions about Duffy’s expenses emerged in 2012.
On Feb. 27, 2013, Wright received an email from another of Harper’s staff, Chris Woodcock. A Senate subcommittee had asked all senators who claimed housing expenses while staying in Ottawa to submit a driver’s licence, health card and income-tax return to prove their primary residence was outside the capital.
The subcommittee’s draft report stated that it was “neither in our mandate nor our jurisdiction to make any findings on the constitutional question of residency.”
Woodcock told Wright the section was “clearly problematic,” and that “the PM mentioned to me that this report should say that all Senators are qualified to sit in the Senate on the basis of owning a residence.” Woodcock said he had “rewritten the report extensively.”
Wright responded a short time later that he had “added a number of changes, including a sentence that they might gag on, but which satisfies what the PM has asked for.”
It’s unclear what happened after that, as the final report, tabled the next day by Conservative Sen. David Tkachuk and published on the Senate website, maintains the original language saying that the subcommittee did not look at residency questions.
The question of whether Duffy and others met their constitutional residency requirements emerged in other places. On Feb. 19, 2013, Wright wrote to several other members of Harper’s staff to say that “we will defend (and defeat) any motion” that raises questions about a Conservative senator’s qualifications.
Wright added that Harper’s view was “ownership of property equates to residence,” and that if questions were raised about Duffy or fellow Conservative senators Pamela Wallin and Dennis Patterson, “we would point to their property ownership and deep, continuing ties.”
Harper appointed Duffy, who had lived and worked in Ottawa since the 1970s, as a senator from Prince Edward Island. He named Wallin as a senator for Saskatchewan, although she had also lived outside the province for most of her life, while Patterson represents the Northwest Territories.
Wright and PMO lawyer Benjamin Perrin also struggled with drafting new residency rules. One thought was to use the Income Tax Act’s residency test, but Wright wrote that “the idea will not work since a prime objective is not to disqualify our sitting Senators.”
Original Article
Source: canada.com/
Author: LEE BERTHIAUME
No comments:
Post a Comment