Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 5th, 2008

[Allan Rock]

At the time, I was told that we had to inform the holders of the Swiss bank accounts. If the RCMP, through the government, asked for access to documents related to a particular bank account in Switzerland, the holder of the bank account must be informed and given a copy of the letter of request. That is why Mr. Schreiber and Mr. Moores received a copy of the letter.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

All these people were informed about the investigation. So they had all the time they needed to cause any accounting records to disappear, particularly where cash was involved.

[Allan Rock]

They certainly received notification, but I have no information about what they did after that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Martin, please.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Mr. Rock.

Mr. Rock, I think I speak for a lot of Canadians when I say we want our money back, and that's certainly one of the reasons we're pushing this issue now, because Brian Mulroney sued the Government of Canada for $50 million because we implied he had taken money from Karlheinz Schreiber. We now know he did take money from Karlheinz Schreiber, and I take you at your word that you probably wouldn't have recommended a settlement had you known that then.

I can't understand, though, and maybe you can help me understand, why we sent letters of apology to Schreiber and to Moores, as well as to Brian Mulroney. It isn't part of the settlement agreement--I read it very thoroughly--but the Government of Canada felt it necessary to apologize to Schreiber and to Frank Moores in the same context as they were apologizing to Mr. Mulroney.

I'll ask you to answer that, but the last thing I'll say, because we have so little time, is that a lot of people feel you folded too early. A lot of people feel the Liberals were eager to get rid of this investigation because, if they dug too deeply, they would learn that Schreiber was meeting with André Ouellet, Schreiber was meeting with Doug Young, Schreiber was meeting with Allan J. MacEachen. Schreiber was right into the Liberal Party, just as he was right into the Conservative Party at the time. Perhaps you'd like to address that to a lot of people, the people who generally feel you folded too soon, and it was partly so the Liberal Party wouldn't get damaged by a proper investigation.

[Allan Rock]

Let me address both questions.

First of all, the letters to Schreiber and Moores were sent as a matter of logic and as a matter of law. The advice I had from the department, with which I agreed, was that the gist of the reason we apologized to Mr. Mulroney was the language used in the letter of request, and if you read that language, you'll see it was conclusory. We're used to language that says it's alleged that someone did something, it's alleged that such and such took place, but this language, while sometimes it says that, goes much further than that. It asserts as a matter of fact that there was criminal activity. That's why an apology was given.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

It's a little galling for Canadians to be apologizing to Karlheinz Schreiber for inconveniencing, and believe me, that's--

[Allan Rock]

If I could just conclude that answer, Mr. Martin, that same language was used for the other two as well. I believe one of them at the time had also commenced a lawsuit. So it was felt that it was in the public interest to avoid further payments to get that done.

Let me answer your second question. We were ready to go to trial on January 2, 1997. We'd lined up expert witnesses; we'd given notice of the experts' reports; we had no fewer than three or four lawyers ready to go; we got the documents lined up; we'd subpoenaed witnesses; we believed we had good defences in law--I've described what they were. That night, I was told that in the fall of 1995, an RCMP member had disclosed to a third party that Mr. Mulroney's name was in the letter of request. I was also advised by our counsel, and I agreed, that when that became public at the trial, it would significantly weaken our defence. I was ready to go to trial, and we were ready to rely on those defences, until they were taken away from us. In those circumstances, we went back to the negotiating table to make the best deal we could.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

I understand that.

Did you ever meet with Karlheinz Schreiber when you were a minister?

[Allan Rock]

No. I never met the man.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Did Marc Lalonde ever represent Mr. Schreiber to you or other members of your cabinet, to your knowledge, lobbying on behalf of Mr. Schreiber?

[Allan Rock]

No.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you.

Mr. Mulcair has a question.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Time is short, so I will go directly to my point.

You said earlier that you did not know whether the RCMP was aware of the payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash from Mr. Schreiber to Mr. Mulroney. You added that Mr. Gray never raised this issue with you, but that it was up to you to decide whether or not to settle the Mulroney-Schreiber affair.

What concrete steps did you take to find out about this matter? What did you do to learn more about the file? Did you ask what was known before deciding to pay out $2.1 million in taxpayers' money?

[Allan Rock]

The decision to settle was made by the government. Mr. Gray, who was the Solicitor General of Canada, and I shared the responsibility for responding to this litigation in court. Did we undertake any investigations ourselves? The answer is no. We asked our counsel to represent us in court, to ask questions—

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

We are getting off topic a little, Mr. Rock. I will come back to my question. You were responsible for the administration of justice for all of Canada. You were about to write a cheque for $2.1 million to a former prime minister for the pain and suffering he experienced because people had associated him with Mr. Schreiber. We now know the truth of the matter.

What concrete steps did you take to find out more about this file before making this recommendation? You seem to want to back off now by saying that this was a government decision. It was your decision.

[Allan Rock]

This was my recommendation to the government, after I received the analysis from the lawyers involved in this case. What did we do? We dealt with the litigation, we asked Mr. Mulroney some questions and we accepted his testimony as a former prime minister of Canada.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

What did the RCMP tell you? Did you ask the RCMP any questions?

[Allan Rock]

I'm sure that Mr. Gray, like myself, examined the facts presented in court to determine whether or not we could win. Once, I was told that a member of the RCMP revealed—

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

That is an unproven allegation. I want to come back to what you know.

[Allan Rock]

No, that was a reality in court.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

No, what I want to know is this. You were the minister, you made a recommendation, but did you or did you not ask the following simple question: What does the RCMP know about this matter?

[Allan Rock]

Mr. Mulcair, my concern as Attorney General for Canada and Minister of Justice, together with Mr. Gray, for the government side in this civil litigation was to deal with it properly, in keeping with the opinion of our lawyers. Until January 2, the lawyers said we had a case. After it was discovered that the RCMP officer had revealed this information to a third party, they told me we did not. That is why we settled the way we did.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

I am sorry, Mr. Mulcair, your time is up.

Mr. Van Kesteren is next in the final question session.

[Dave Van Kesteren, Conservative, Chatham-Kent—Essex, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Rock, for appearing before us this afternoon.

While you were justice minister—we've established all this—you commenced an investigation into the Airbus purchase, Air Canada, and the Cape Breton Bear Head project proposal. You said a few minutes ago that had you known what you know today, you wouldn't have pulled the plug on the investigation.

But I would remind you that on April 22, 2003, the RCMP admitted that after an exhaustive investigation, no wrongdoing involving Airbus or the Bear Head project existed. They said, and I quote:

After an exhaustive investigation in Canada and abroad, the RCMP has concluded its investigation into allegations of wrongdoing involving MBB Helicopters, Thyssen and Airbus…. The RCMP has now concluded that the remaining allegations cannot be substantiated and that no charges will be laid.

I think that's important, because I want to go to a series of questions that relate to this committee's mandate.

Do you have any evidence to offer this committee of any wrongdoing by any public official regarding the Bear Head project?