Information & Ethics Committee on Sept. 27th, 2018

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

In other words, you still deny that there was any knowledge about the source of the data that you were working with, whether it was raw data or otherwise.

[Zackary Massingham]

Yes.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

How much time do I have?

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

About a minute.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Massingham, can you tell us about the contract that you entered into with a U.K. company called Hanbury and Mr. Ameet Gill to represent AIQ's interests in the United Kingdom in 2017?

[Zackary Massingham]

I think that was just a meeting for a small consulting project. I'm not sure anything really came of it.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Has it expired?

[Zackary Massingham]

I believe so, yes. We didn't do much work.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

I'll relinquish time until next time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bob Zimmer]

Thank you, Mr. Kent.

Next up, for seven minutes, is Mr. Angus.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Massingham, for joining us. We were sorry you didn't join us last time. I hope you're feeling better.

[Zackary Massingham]

Thanks for having me back.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

One of the questions we were trying to figure out with the BeLeave campaign was you were paid basically about a million dollars Canadian for about six days' work, and there was very little data gathered in that time. Mr. Silvester explained that your role with the project wasn't to collect data but to place ads.

Was that the role that you had with BeLeave?

[Zackary Massingham]

That's correct. Any pledges they might have received were a happy extra for them.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Okay.

In those six days, June 16 to June 23, 2016, you were placing ads for the BeLeave campaign, and that's where the money went?

[Zackary Massingham]

I believe so, yes.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

The U.K. Information Commissioner's Office reports that “BeLeave did not...run any ads, albeit their electoral returns indicates they committed expenditure to this”, and the privacy commissioner also found that the BeLeave campaign didn't run any ads.

What were you doing if you weren't running ads?

[Zackary Massingham]

I'm sorry; we were showing ads on Facebook, on BeLeave's ads account. I'm confused by the statement there that—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Did you read the findings of the U.K. information commissioner's and the electoral commissioner's report on your work?

[Zackary Massingham]

Jeff has been handling that particular matter, but what—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

You're the CEO and you didn't read it? It says you didn't place any ads. I'm confused. You got paid a million dollars. If you didn't place ads, where did the money go?

[Zackary Massingham]

I'm telling you here today that we did place ads and those ads were placed in BeLeave's ad account and their budget was spent on their ads.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Okay.

You say that the information commissioner's report and the electoral commissioner's report is wrong.

[Zackary Massingham]

Perhaps it's simply misinterpreted.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Misinterpreted?