I put people on notice on April 2, on my motion:
That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(h)(vi) and given the testimony provided by the former Attorney General of Canada, public office holders Katie Telford, Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister, and Ben Chin, Chief of Staff to the Minister of Finance, be invited before the Committee to answer questions related to their conduct in inappropriately pressuring the former Attorney General and members of her staff in order to secure a deferred prosecution agreement for SNC-Lavalin.
I think this motion is important. It follows up on the work my colleague offered in the previous motion, but this is about the obligation that public office holders have to respect the rule of law. If we do not abide by that simple principle, then we are an outlier state, which is why the OECD right now is monitoring Canada.
The roles of Katie Telford and Ben Chin have to be looked at, because the evidence.... My colleagues on the other side have clearly said they're not contradicting any of the evidence that Ms. Wilson-Raybould gave. Her evidence stands. Her evidence is that Ben Chin inappropriately approached her staff and attempted to pressure them on behalf of SNC-Lavalin to interfere with the public prosecution, and was told that this was unacceptable interference—which it is, under how our legal system is structured.
The question we have to ask is whether Mr. Morneau was inappropriately pressuring. The evidence, which my Liberal colleagues seem to be willing to accept in Ms. Wilson-Raybould's testimony, is that she told the finance minister to back off, that this was inappropriate and that this would certainly be a violation of the law.
The question about Ben Chin is what his obligation to his minister was. Was it to advise him on the obligations he has to meet the rule of law, to respect the rule of law, to know that he has no right to interfere with the Attorney General in attempting to interfere in this prosecution of a bribery case against SNC-Lavalin? Mr. Chin needs to be called here, not voluntarily, to say if he has anything to contradict. It's to ask him about whether he respects the code that he has been called to uphold.
The same questions need to be applied to Ms. Katie Telford. The testimony we have received—which my colleagues on the Liberal side say is not being challenged—is that, in her pressure to Ms. Wilson-Raybould's office, she said they were not interested in legalities. That is a shocking statement to make. If the Prime Minister's chief adviser is not interested in whether they are breaking the law, then we are lawless. Was she doing that because the Prime Minister didn't care about the rule of law?
We do not have the power at committee to bring in the Prime Minister. We had Mr. Butts come. Mr. Butts was forced to resign. Mr. Butts was forced to resign, he said, because he wanted to do a whole bunch of other things in life. But he was unable to contradict the testimony of Ms. Wilson-Raybould, where she said that Mr. Butts told her there was no way they were going to get through this without interference. Interference is interfering in the role of the public prosecutor.
Ms. Telford has not come forward. Seemingly—if we take the argument of my colleagues on the Liberal side—there is no contesting from Ms. Telford as to whether she said that. They don't seem to be contesting that she said she wasn't interested in legalities. She, as a public office holder, has legal obligations to uphold. We, as a committee that oversees ethics and accountability in Parliament, must ask the Prime Minister's chief of staff to come and explain herself. Is there an outside chance that she was misquoted, or does the issue of the rule of law not matter in the Prime Minister's Office?