Evidence of meeting #7 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was letter.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
At the beginning.
Now, the agreement with GCI was, who is going to get what? How are we going to share it?
December 6th, 2007 / 12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
And when that was agreed upon, I was sitting there, on their request, and transferred funds.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
Well, we had the account for Mr. Ouellet; we had trust companies.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
Yes.
Also, we had a trust company. Mr. Moores had a company called Ticinella. So they did all of these things; they could do whatever they wanted with their money.
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
It's hard to see how those transfers would be of direct benefit to Airbus. I'm just trying to see how it would be to their benefit to have you spreading money.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
I think the whole Airbus thing, the way it was structured between the governments, was....
Also you are aware that the German party, the Christian Social Union, got a substantial amount of money.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
And I have a certain understanding that other funds went for François Mitterrand. This is so common over there, I wouldn't even have thought about it.
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
Did it raise any ethical questions for you? Did your ethical radar go off at the fact that Gerry Doucet was lobbying the government, even though his brother, Fred Doucet, was a special assistant to the Prime Minister, and also that Frank Moores was lobbying the government for Airbus and was also sitting on the board, or was put on the board of directors, of Air Canada?
Is that normal in your world?
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
You saw the correspondence with Mr. Moores and that he had several meetings with Franz Josef Strauss, so you're not telling me that I have to decide what the chairman of Airbus Industries agrees upon and I have to do it?
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
But this is the ethics committee. It isn't a court, though I know you're being treated as if you were on trial here, or something like that, given some of the rigorous cross-examination. It's the ethics committee, and what we're trying to get down to is whether there were breaches of ethics by public office holders in this country.
In your estimation, did anybody cross any lines, or was this just business as usual in Canada in 1988?
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
Mr. Martin, as I said, I know how the whole thing got together when Max Ward got domestic flying rights after the election was done. There are many things.
I had no feeling directly of what might go on, because we sent invoices from my companies to GCI, from Liechtenstein companies to Fred Doucet's company. This was a whole bunch of transactions. What they did with it, how could I go into that?
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
But the United States ambassador called it bribery. He said Boeing lost this job in Canada because Airbus bribed their way all over Ottawa and secured the deal.
That's what a lot of people think.
12:45 p.m.
As an Individual
Yes, and the FBI was with the RCMP and complained about all of this, and the RCMP told them, please, do an official complaint and we will go after this. But they said, no, no, we are not going to do this; we don't want to show up as if we're smearing here, and on top of this we don't know whether Mr. Mulroney will be re-elected.
I know that.
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
Okay. I'm going to have to pass this over to my colleague, Mr. Comartin.
12:45 p.m.
NDP
Joe Comartin NDP Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Mr. Schreiber, just before or at the time the $2.1 million settlement to Mr. Mulroney was made, you received a letter of apology from Mr. Rock and I think someone else. Is that correct?