While we're on the topic of corporate control of media, how about the scandal involving the Liberal party of Canada? So far I have only heard one side of the story on that matter. I have not heard anything by Liberal party congresspersons, or the chair of the Liberal party. Was there something going on, but someone out there seized the day and blew it way out of proportion?
I will present this fairly balanced timeline and explanation of events from the
CBC, without all the rhetoric and opinions.(emphasis added)
Federal sponsorship scandal
CBC News Online |
GOMERY REPORT
There had been rumours and whispers about a fund that had been set up in the wake of the 1995 referendum on Quebec sovereignty to help promote federalism. The money was supposed to be used to raise Canadas profile in Quebec.
The fund was run by the Public Works Department, headed at the time by Alfonso Gagliano, then Prime Minister Jean Chrétiens Quebec lieutenant.
But it wasnt clear how the money was handed out: there were no application forms for this fund that was supposed to help pay the costs of social and cultural events and programs. There were rumours that the money was little more than a vehicle to reward loyal Liberal supporters.
By the early spring of 2002, Chrétien was forced to address the issue. The Globe and Mail under the Access to Information Act tried to find out why the government paid $550,000 to Groupaction Marketing for a report that could not be found. No one at Public Works or the company could explain it.
Chrétien asked Auditor General Sheila Fraser to see what she could find out. She learned enough to launch a full investigation and to ask the RCMP to get involved as well.
On Feb. 10, 2004, Fraser released her audit of the federal sponsorship program.
The scathing report used words such as "scandalous" and "appalling" to describe how the Liberal government abused the system.
She found that $100 million was paid to a variety of communications agencies in the form of fees and commissions and said the program was basically designed to generate commissions for these companies rather than to produce any benefit for Canadians.
Officials in Canada's Public Works Department "broke just about every rule in the book" when it came to awarding contracts to Groupaction Inc., Fraser said.
Prime Minister Paul Martin ordered a public inquiry into how the sponsorship program was handled. He fired Gagliano, who had been appointed ambassador to Denmark. Five days later, Martin promised to resign if there was evidence that he knew about fraud in the program.
Two weeks after Frasers report was released, Martin suspended the heads of three Crown corporations: Michel Vennat, president of the Business Development Bank of Canada, Via Rail president Marc LeFrançois and Canada Post president André Ouellet. The report showed that five Crown corporations and agencies the RCMP, VIA Rail, the Old Port of Montreal, the Business Development Bank of Canada and Canada Post played a role in transferring money through questionable means.
All three men would eventually be fired.
The revelations from the unravelling scandal would cost the Liberals dearly in the election of June 28, 2004: their majority evaporated and for the first time in 25 years Canada had a minority government.
By September, Justice John Gomery would begin hearing testimony at the inquiry into the scandal.
On Feb. 8, 2005, former prime minister Jean Chrétien appeared before the Gomery inquiry. He vigorously defended the federal sponsorship program as an important part of the battle against Quebec sovereigntists in the wake of the 1995 referendum.
Mistakes were made, Chrétien conceded, and people who stole money should be punished.
Two days later, Prime Minister Martin the man who called the inquiry gave his testimony. He appeared a year to the day after he ordered the inquiry. It was the first time since Canada was six years old that a sitting prime minister testified before a public inquiry.
After Chrétien and Martin completed their testimony, the inquiry shifted to Montreal, where it would get to the "meatier" side of the story. Witnesses would include some of the people at the heart of sponsorship scandal.
Among them would be Jean Brault who ran Groupaction, an advertising company that was paid millions doing work for the government under the sponsorship program; Paul Coffin, who ran another advertising company that did well under the program; and Chuck Guité, who ran the program for the government.
But there would be complications all three men faced criminal charges, accused of defrauding the government out of millions of dollars under the sponsorship program. Gomery would order a ban on the publication of their testimony because their appearances before the inquiry were scheduled for a few weeks before the beginning of their trials.
Coffin would later plead guilty to six counts of fraud. The trial of Guité and Brault would be delayed until the spring of 2006 and eventually the publication bans would be lifted.
Gomerys Nov. 1, 2005, report is the first and probably the more interesting of two reports to come from his inquiry. The who-knew-what-when document will be followed by a how-do-we-prevent-it-from-happening-again report. That one is due in February 2006.
Prime Minister Martin has promised to call an election within 30 days of the release of that report.
This is a
link showing who knew what, and when.
Notice it does NOT implicate the current Prime Minister Paul Martin!
Jean Chrétien, former prime minister:
He launched the sponsorship fund as a way to raise the profile of the federal government within Quebec in the wake of the 1995 sovereignty referendum, and thus convince Quebecers that remaining in Canada was worthwhile.
Jean Pelletier, Chrétien's former chief of staff:
The report said Pelletier, for whom Chrétien was "personally" responsible because he was a political appointee, essentially acted as a cabinet minister as far as the sponsorship program was concerned, playing a key role in distributing funds to parts of Quebec where Chrétien perceived the separatist threat was particularly strong. "Mr. Pelletier failed to fulfill that responsibility, in that he did not give adequate direction to the subordinates in [Public Works] to whom he was delegating the task of administrating a new program."
Alfonso Gagliano, former public works minister, senior Liberal organizer in Quebec:
He had claimed that Guité ran the program and they rarely discussed it, let alone decided which projects would receive funding. "Contrary to his testimony to the effect that his participation was limited to providing political input and making recommendations about events and projects to be sponsored, Mr. Gagliano became directly involved in decisions to provide funding to events and projects for partisan purposes, having little to do with considerations of national unity," wrote Gomery. "The evidence is overwhelming that Mr. Gagliano was a hands-on manager who took a great interest in the sponsorship program and an active part in its direction."
Chuck Guité, Public Works bureaucrat in charge of sponsorship program from 1996-99.
This "man without scruples" comes in for a large chunk of Gomery's criticism, for breaking government tendering rules, for directing contracts to friends, for dealing harshly with a whistleblower, and for accepting consulting fees from Quebec advertising agencies after leaving government.
Jean Brault, president of Groupaction Marketing Inc.
His company and its subsidiaries managed $89.5 million worth of sponsorship projects, allowing the company's net revenues to rise from $314,000 in 1994 to almost $1.5 million five years later, at the height of the program, the forensic audit conducted for the inquiry found. Brault and his wife drew salaries of almost $4 million between 1992 and 2001, and collected dividends of $2.7 million.
I am including a link with a short explanation of how Canada's Political Sytem works!
Hope this helps!
