The National Citizens Coalition, which released a controversial attack ad against Interim Liberal Leader Bob Rae (Toronto Centre, Ont.) last weekend, indirectly supported Mr. Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) and the Conservatives by attacking their opponents with advertisements placed in national newspapers and with radio stations in several electoral districts during the campaign for the May 2 election.
But because of the separation between contributions and expenses for third parties that oppose or support parties and candidates or their policies in elections, the financial contributions to the National Citizens Coalition, which Mr. Harper led for several years after he temporarily left politics in 2007, are not included under the contribution limits for Conservative donors, even though they have the same purpose—support for the governing Conservatives.
A Hill Times comparison of contribution statements the Conservative Party and the National Citizens Coalition filed with Elections Canada last year found four examples of Conservative supporters who donated more than $1,000 to the Citizens Coalition and also contributed the maximum of $1,100 to the Conservative party.
Judith R. Wilder of Toronto, who told The Hill Times she has been a supporter of the National Citizens Coalition since insurance company executive Colin Brown founded it in 1967, gave the coalition $2,000 in the midst of the campaign for the May 2 election. Conservative Party filings with Elections Canada show Ms. Wilder also contributed $1,100 to the party, on Feb. 1, 2011.
Francois Feyter of Fort Macleod, Alta., whose name appears as Frans Feyter on the National Citizens Coalition report, contributed $1,000 to the National Citizens Coalition on April 4, during the federal election campaign, and contributed $1,100 to the Conservative Party three days later.
William Nicholls, of Cambridge, Ont., donated $1,100 to the Conservative Party on Feb. 1 last year.
Bill Nicholls of Cambridge, Ont., whose city and postal code from the two lists match exactly, donated $1,000 to the National Citizens Coalition on April 19.
One of the names on the list of National Citizens Coalition contributors, Darey Rector of Toronto, who donated $10,000 to the lobby group, appears to match the name of Darcy Rector of Etobicoke, Ont., now part of the amalgamated City of Toronto, who donated $1,100 to the Conservative Party on Feb. 1, 2011. There are only three Rectors listed in Etobicoke, and the only one with the first initial D., with the same postal code as the Rector on both contributions lists, could not be reached.
Other supporters of the National Citizens Coalition are also found on the Elections Canada list of contributors to the Conservative Party during, before, and after the election last year, but in smaller amounts. The fourth quarter of 2011 political donations is yet to be posted by Elections Canada.
As the controversy swirled this week over the National Citizens Coalition attack ad against Rae—an election-campaign style YouTube video that dredges up Ontario’s economic and governmental woes when he was NDP premier from 1990 to 1995—National Citizens Coalition president Peter Coleman said, in an exchange of emails with The Hill Times, that the ad was not produced either at the request of Mr. Harper or Conservative officials and that he and the coalition “do not work for the Conservative Party, never have, never will.”
“If you want to call the ad an attack ad fine,” Mr. Coleman said in the email. “What the country needs is a Liberal party with a leader that can present an alternative to the Conservatives. Having a leader like Bob Rae who believes in big government to the max is not what the Liberal party needs.”
But the furor over the ad, with Liberal and New Democrat MPs saying its ferocity suggests Parliament should review the role of heavily-financed third-party lobby groups between elections, focused further attention on relations between the National Citizens Coalition and the Conservatives.
CBC reporter and blogger Kady O’Malley reported a firm owned by the National Citizens Coalition’s director in Ottawa, conservative blogger Stephen Taylor, was contracted during the election campaign to do more than $7,000 worth of creative internet work for the National Citizens Coalition as well as separately for three Conservative candidates—Mani Fallon, who lost an election bid in the B.C. riding of Newton-North Delta and MPs Russ Hiebert (South Surrey-White Rock- Cloverdale, B.C.) and Randy Hoback (Prince Albert, Sask.).
In an unusual twist, which Ottawa Citizen reporter and blogger Glen McGregor took up in a blog post on Thursday, the National Citizens Coalition filings with Elections Canada show that although the coalition raised $168,960 from 873 donors during the election campaign, it spent only $48,383.97 on election advertising—leaving it with a healthy fund, apparently, to conduct subsequent campaigns such as the attack ad against Mr. Rae.
Mr. Coleman bristled after The Hill Times asked him in an email on Wednesday, when it began probing the NCC’s failure to spend the full amount it had raised, well under the third-party campaign spending limit of $188,250 in total across the country.
“As far as how we spend our money, quite frankly that is none of your business,” Mr. Coleman said in the Wednesday email.
“Because we have had problems in the past with Elections Canada, we record all revenue received during the federal election writ period as revenue whether that money was intended or designated towards election ads,” he said.
“Many donors give us money for general operations and other campaigns or issues that have nothing to do with election advertising. By recording all revenue there is no way the Elections Canada people can give us a hard time,” said Mr. Coleman, who was treasurer of the National Citizens Coalition when Mr. Harper served as president at its headquarters in Calgary at the time.
Mr. Harper took Elections Canada to court when he was the National Citizens Coalition president, in an attempt to have third-party spending limits declared an unconstitutional violation of free speech. He eventually lost the case in the Supreme Court of Canada, and the NCC later reached a compliance agreement with Elections Canada over alleged illegal campaign advertising.
Two National Citizens Coalition election donors who spoke to The Hill Times, Ms. Wilder and Margaret Phippen of Manitouwadge, Ont., said they were surprised the National Citizens Coalition did not spend all of the money it had raised for the election, although Ms. Wilder said she supports all of the group’s activities.
Two others—Mr. Feyter and John Elliott of Midhurst, Ont., who contributed $10,000 to the Coalition during the campaign—said it did not trouble them.
“I just leave it up to them, I guess,” said Mr. Feyter. “Maybe they’re going to use it wisely, spend it on something else. Why spend $160,000 if you’ve got it, just because it’s there.”
Mr. Elliott said he did “not necessarily” expect his $10,000 to be spent on the election campaign when he donated $10,000 on April 28, four days before the election.
“I support the association and that’s that,” he said. Asked if he expected all the money to be spent on the election, Mr. Elliott, a longtime supporter of the Coalition, said: “It’s not my business, it’s their business.”
The National Citizens Coalition, meanwhile, came under fresh criticism on Thursday for the attack ad against Mr. Rae.
University of Toronto professor Stephen Clarkson, who has written several books about the Liberal party, called the attack “disgusting character assassination.”
He said the phenomenon is “destroying Canada’s civic culture, which is based on reasonable people reasoning together about where the country should go and how it should get there.”
“It is not just the quantity of money available for political advertising that should be controlled; it is also the content that should be regulated, an issue which had long been a loophole in Canada’s otherwise admirable election finance legislation,” Mr. Clarkson said.
Original Article
Source: Hill Times
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