Justice Committee on Feb. 27th, 2019

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

This was not something that I issued through the gazetting process. This was a directive, an internal directive, that I'm really happy to have issued internally within the Department of Justice in terms of indigenous litigation. This did not go through the gazetting process because it was a directive to the litigators in the Department of Justice.

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Milton, ON]

That helps me very much. Now I know why it's not on the list, so that's good. But these things are rare. They're very unique and special.

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

They are very rare. That's not to say that it's not a tool that an Attorney General can utilize. General directives, the two that we've spoken about, have been issued but there has never been a specific directive issued on a particular case before the courts, nor has there ever been utilized, under section 15, an Attorney General taking over the prosecution. It would be a first if that were to happen.

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Milton, ON]

Extraordinary. Thank you.

I have a question about some testimony that the Clerk of the Privy Council gave to this committee. I'm a little troubled by an inconsistency, I'll be honest, and I just wanted to get your take on this. It's not that difficult. It's not he-said-she-said this time.

The Clerk of the Privy Council told us that he learned that a deferred prosecution agreement was not going to be offered to SNC-Lavalin some time after September 17, some time in the fall he said; and he learned about it through a National Newswatch story.

Your testimony here tells me that he was sitting in the room for the meeting where the Prime Minister brought up the deferred prosecution agreement. Is that your recollection that he was in the room on September 17 and would have known that SNC-Lavalin had been told by that point that they were not getting a deferred prosecution agreement because he was part of the conversation around that topic?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

The Clerk of the Privy Council would have known on the September 17 meeting because I specifically mentioned it to both him and the Prime Minister, and went into detail about the section 13 notice that I received. Again, I was very clear that I had already made my decision around the deferred prosecution agreement and not intervening.

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Milton, ON]

This committee is here to study a number of issues and to probe the conversations that you had. Committees by nature tend to send reports to Parliament as a result of their study. I'm wondering if you would have any recommendations for this committee for their report in order to help into the future. I'm not getting into any specifics, but having gone through what you've gone through, anything that you think we should be reporting into Parliament would be helpful to our colleagues.

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Well, now that you mention it, this is a very serious question, and I'm going to give you a serious answer, and I've thought about this a lot. I hope that the committee takes in, to your previous question, as much information and evidence as they can. I appreciate the study on remediation agreements, talking about a relatively old doctrine, the Shawcross doctrine.

I would think it would be a very useful study for this committee to look at the role of the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and whether or not those two roles should be bifurcated.

I believe, and I have believed this for some time, even before I became the Attorney General, that our country would benefit from a detailed study and consideration around having the Attorney General not sit around the cabinet table, like they have in the United Kingdom.

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Milton, ON]

Thank you.

Is that it?

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

You have 10 seconds.

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Milton, ON]

That would be it. Take a breath. Have a drink of water.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Thank you very much.

Ms. O'Connell.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to speak a little bit about the testimony of Mr. Wernick, Clerk of the Privy Council. He spoke about the Shawcross issue—I'm paraphrasing, but I'm sure we can pull it up the exact text—in the context of there always being conversations. I think even you acknowledge that there are legitimate conversations to be had for consideration.

Mr. Wernick pointed out, and I am quoting the part of Shawcross that I think is relevant here:

In order so to inform himself, he may, although I do not think he is obligated to, consult with any of his colleagues in the Government; and indeed, as Lord Simon once said, he would in some cases be a fool if he did not.

In your testimony today, you mentioned that on September 16, when your chief of staff had a phone call with Mr. Bouchard and Mr. Marques, the comments were, “We think we should get some outside advice on this.” Again, referring to your testimony, on October 18, it was also Mr. Bouchard who spoke to your chief of staff, and asked if they could have the option of seeking external legal opinion on a DPP's decision not to extend an invitation.

Referring back to September 16, you said that you had made up your mind on the issue, and that you were not going to intervene. However, in that September 16 commentary you provided, it was expressed that they said they understood that the individual Crown prosecutor wanted to negotiate an agreement, but the director did not. That somewhat indicates to me that even on the prosecution side, there was debate. There was debate on whether or not this was appropriate.

Is it unreasonable then, if there's still debate, even within the Crown prosecutor's office, or whomever they are referring to there, to bring out other advice that was asked for on September 16, as well as on October 18, to see what legal options there were. Clearly, whether it was with you, your office or the Prime Minister's Office, within the prosecution there seemed to be disagreements or differences of opinion.

Why would it have been unreasonable—and then referring back to the Wernick testimony and Shawcross—to say that you would want to consult as much as possible on these types of matters? If there were still some differences of opinion, what would the objection be to bringing in another opinion, an outside legal opinion?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Well, I think I'm fine with it. We're going over very similar ground here, but I had made my decision as the Attorney General. I did not need external legal counsel. I did not need people in the Prime Minister's Office continuing to suggest that I needed external legal counsel. That's inappropriate. I will say, with respect to the conversations you mentioned, and Mathieu Bouchard's remarks about an individual prosecutor's opinion being different from that of the director of public prosecutions, I can't help but wonder why he would bring that up. How would he know that? How had he garnered that information?

It is entirely inappropriate for any member of the Prime Minister's Office, and it would be entirely inappropriate for any member of staff within my department to reflect those conversations, because I would have serious concerns—and I did at the time, and still do—about how that information was acquired, and from whom.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you.

If you felt that information was so inappropriate on September 16, did you consider resigning? If it's moving forward, and they continued, did you not consider resigning then?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I did not consider resigning then. I was, in my opinion, doing my job as the Attorney General. I was protecting a fundamental constitutional principle of prosecutorial independence, and the independence of our judiciary. That's my job. That was my job, rather, as the Attorney General. As long as I was the Attorney General, I was going to ensure that the independence of the director of public prosecutions in the exercise of their discretion was not interfered with.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Do you still have confidence in the Prime Minister today?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I'm not sure how that question is relevant.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Thank you very much.

We will now go to Mr. Paul-Hus.

Mr. Paul-Hus, Mr. Cooper has asked me to give him the last three minutes of this five minutes, so I'm just going to tell you at two minutes that we're going to Mr. Cooper.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Wilson-Raybould, on December 19, when you received the call from Mr. Wernick, the Clerk of the Privy Council and Canada's most senior public servant, he said that he wanted to give you context on this issue. How did you feel about that?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I believe that the Clerk also made similar comments when he was before the justice committee. As the Attorney General at that point, after four months of these conversations—well, actually, not even after four months—after making my decision, I was entirely comfortable that I had the appropriate context in which to make my decision. I did not, as the Attorney General, live in a vacuum. I had the ability to engage and read papers, and have discussions about the reality of SNC and deferred prosecution agreements. Of course, I was sitting around the cabinet table. I didn't need any context.

I certainly didn't need context about exactly the same context that I was provided four months previous to that.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Did you feel that this was an obstruction of justice?

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Of course I did. It wasn't interference, because I never let it happen. Let's be clear about that. There was a concerted and sustained effort to attempt to politically interfere with my role as the Attorney General. As the Attorney General, I did not let that happen.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Thank you, Ms. Wilson-Raybould.

[Michael Cooper, St. Albert—Edmonton, CPC]

Thank you very much, Ms. Wilson-Raybould. It's a sad day, and I thank you very much for your candour here at committee.

On the subject of the Clerk of the Privy Council and the call you had on December 19, was it typical to receive a call from the Clerk of the Privy Council? Did that happen often?