Rob Walsh sat ringside in Parliament for 20 years and watched a paradox unfold. As MPs historically reasserted their ancient parliamentary privileges, bitter partisan politics steadily eroded the rules and respect for the institution that is supposed to keep the government’s power in check.As the House of Commons’ top legal adviser, he counselled MPs through an unprecedented period in Canada’s history as committees flexed their muscles and aggressively invoked their parliamentary privilege to see papers and records and call witnesses so they could get to the bottom of issues and hold the government to account.
Walsh was front-and-centre during the legal wrangling around the highly politicized and historic files of the past decade. He guided MPs through committee probes of disgraced privacy commissioner George Radwanski, who was found in contempt of Parliament; the RCMP pension and insurance fraud and contempt proceedings against former RCMP deputy commissioner Barbara George; the sponsorship scandal that toppled the Liberals; businessman Karlheinz Schreiber’s business dealings with former prime minister Brian Mulroney; the release of documents on the treatment of Afghanistan prisoners detained by Canadian forces.
He was a key player in the issuance of the rarely used Speakers warrant, which put Schreiber, facing deportation, into parliament’s custody to testify at committee. Members also conslted him before the opposition found the Conservative government to be in contempt of Parliament for the first time in history.