Information & Ethics Committee on Dec. 2nd, 2010

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

What exactly do you mean?

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

Read all the letters and show me where I talk about honesty.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

So you never talked about his honesty.

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

Of course I never talked about his honesty. I did talk about his competence.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

For you, competence and honesty are two separate things. You can be honest and competent, or rather, you can't be honest and incompetent.

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

I hope that I'm both honest and competent.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Yes, I agree that you have a very good reputation, Mr. Ménard. I want to thank you for accepting the committee's invitation to appear.

You told us this afternoon that you felt it was not a mistake not to have disclosed what you described as an attempt to offer you a bribe. Is that what you are saying?

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

No. An attempt was made to offer me an election contribution in a manner that is not consistent with the provisions of the act.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Well that is what I would call a bribe.

Did you talk about it?

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

You are very quick to jump to conclusions. In my profession, I became accustomed to rigour. So, I don't use the term “bribe” when it doesn't apply. In any case, people's interpretation would have been a rigourous one—

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

You were appointed Minister of Justice; you were a symbol of probity in Quebec. Did you discuss this with the person who appointed you—Jacques Parizeau?

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

No, except—

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Did you discuss it with Lucien Bouchard?

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

—last Saturday—

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Yes, more recently.

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

—and he said that I had no business informing him at all, and that he trusted me.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Did you discuss it with Lucien Bouchard?

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

No, because I told you I discussed it with no one. I even thought I had not discussed it with—

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Let's finish the answer. Both of you are speaking at once.

Monsieur Ménard, go ahead.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

I have a lot of questions, Mr. Chairman.

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

No, I did not discuss it. As I said, I even thought I hadn't discussed it with my wife.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

In 1999, you imposed a whistleblowing policy on police officers in Quebec, whereby officers are required to disclose any misconduct by their peers under the Police Act.

How do you feel about imposing a rule on police officers that does not seem to apply to politicians?

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

A police officer who might have found himself in the same circumstances as myself would not have been bound by that provision of the Police Act—specifically, section 260.

It's important to understand that a police officer has more extensive duties than an ordinary citizen. I wanted that provision to be in there as a preventative measure. It was introduced for the benefit of young police officers entering the profession, but also for older ones who are still learning. If they know that the people they work with have an obligation to disclose wrongdoing, they may show some restraint and avoid roughing up prisoners—

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

That's fine, Mr. Ménard—

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

—or doing something illegal.