Finance Committee on April 1st, 2021

[Victoria Morton]

I don't remember.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Okay. Craig says you sent it; you now say you don't remember. Okay. That's interesting.

You said that you relied on the database, email correspondence and calendars to piece together the puzzles that helped you write this message that you now say you can't remember writing. Was Mr. Chin in the WE Charity database?

[Victoria Morton]

I don't recall what the process was for this specific one.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Was he in Mr. Kielburger's calendar?

[Victoria Morton]

I can't say yes or no because I can't remember his calendar from a year ago. If he was in the calendar, chances are I would have written something like, “Hi Ben, thanks [Technical difficulty—Editor] fantastic. Looking forward to getting to work. Warmly, Craig.”

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Okay, that's interesting. That's an interesting call. We didn't know that call had happened.

[Victoria Morton]

That wasn't a call. That was an example.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Okay, so it wasn't a call. It was just an example of a call that didn't happen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

I am going to interrupt here, Pierre, for a minute, because I want it to be clear that Ms. Morton said that was an example. She is not saying that call was made if Mr. Chin was in the database. It should be clear.

I will not take the time from you. The floor is yours.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

It is just a bit strange that we're hearing that the email Ms. Morton said she wrote and now says she doesn't know she wrote, if she had written it, might have been the result of a call that might have happened, but in this case didn't.

Have you spoken with any member of WE Charity since the Kielburgers last testified at the ethics committee in March?

[Victoria Morton]

This March, yes.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Have you been getting assistance with your testimony from them or any of their representatives?

[Victoria Morton]

No. The day after his testimony, he called me to check in. He broadly sort of offered me support—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Right.

[Victoria Morton]

—but I wanted to maintain my independence, and these words are all my own.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay.

Thanks, both of you.

We will go to Ms. Dzerowicz, who will be followed by Mr. Ste-Marie.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank everyone for their presentations.

I want to go to three of our witnesses, but I'm going to start off with you very quickly, Ms. Morton, just for the record. Thanks so much for reading out your testimony. It was very helpful. It was also very consistent with what Mr. Craig Kielburger had indicated when he came before us and said, “Sure. I sent a hundred messages because I only had seven or eight people on LinkedIn before that, so that day a hundred messages went out. My [executive assistant] sent them to people to join on LinkedIn, and he was one of them.” You indicated that part of your responsibility in your office was particularly in building up LinkedIn, so I appreciate that.

I would just go very quickly to maybe one more small thing. In my office, I have my staff who do my social media. They are very helpful. They often will have a running list of all the social media they're working on. They will send it to me for any comments. Sometimes I comment on some stuff. Sometimes I change things and send it back to them. On some things I comment, and on some things I don't.

Is that more or less how you worked? You sort of gave a whole bunch of messages in and then some were commented on or not, but you weren't quite sure what, and that sort of came back to you.

[Victoria Morton]

Yes, I would say that's a fair characterization. I would hand him bulk social media posts, bulk potential messages, pitch decks, you name it, and he would kind of spot-check, I imagine.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Okay. Perfect. Thank you.

This is my last question for you. I don't expect this to be a yes, so I don't want you to think this is a trick question. Our topic today is COVID-19 spending on programs. I know that you indicated very clearly you had zero involvement in the Canada student grant program.

Do you have any contribution to the COVID-19 spending and program testimony that we have today?

[Victoria Morton]

That's a great question. I was invited. I have nothing to hide, so I came. It's not really my decision to make.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Okay. Thank you so much.

My next question is for Grant Thornton, Mr. Ladner and Ms. Benham. If I understood you correctly, I believe you indicated that a number of companies you serve realized late in the day that they could have qualified for the wage subsidy program, but by the time they actually figured out that they could qualify, the deadline to apply had passed.

Do I understand that correctly? Could you just say yes or no very quickly?

[Tara Benham]

That's correct.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Perfect.

If someone said, “If a company didn't know they qualified and they still were able to keep their staff and continue to run their business as best they could, maybe they didn't need the wage subsidy”, how would you respond to someone who might say that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Go ahead, Ms. Benham or Mr. Ladner.

[Kevin Ladner]

That's a great question. The fact of the matter is that the program is there to support private business in maintaining the employment of their people. At the end of the day, as has been said earlier, no one knows how long this is going to go on. We just wouldn't want to see that business—because they weren't aware of the deadlines or weren't aware of the filing—put in a worse position than truly they should be because in that example they actually have maintained their employment, and that is key during this period of time.