National Defence Committee on April 19th, 2021

[Elder Marques]

Again, now that I'm a private citizen I'm going to leave the questions of politics to the politicians and those who play in that arena. That's not the arena I'm playing in now. I'm here to just tell you what happened, what we were thinking, what we tried to do and why we were doing what we were doing. I'm happy to be as helpful and candid as I can be to let you have those answers. I'm not here to talk about things that are better suited to other meetings of this committee, or the House of Commons or a press conference.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Okay, but you did work in the Prime Minister's Office. Therefore, you could be viewed as being more knowledgeable about authorities and accountabilities in our democracy than, say, the average person on the street. For us to understand elected responsibility versus public servants, who is the elected—in our democracy—minister or prime minister who holds the public service head, the Clerk of the Privy Council, responsible and accountable?

[Elder Marques]

I don't want to engage in a political science lecture on ministerial responsibility. You are all very capable. I'm not here in that capacity. I'm going to leave it for you to very ably, no doubt, make your arguments in the House and in the public realm about how to understand what happened. I'm just trying to explain to you what was in our minds at the time, how we approached it and what we did to really make sure that PCO was fully engaged in what was then a very unusual situation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much.

We move to Mr. Baker, please.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair, and thank you very much, Mr. Marques, for being with us today.

I want to go back and ask some questions about follow-up on some of the things you've stated in your testimony.

Do you know if having the Clerk of the Privy Council Office look at allegations concerning a Governor in Council appointment was standard practice?

[Elder Marques]

There was probably nothing standard about this situation, either in the manner in which the information came up or then how to respond to it.

The Privy Council itself plays a very active role, and I think sometimes that doesn't get a lot of attention in relation to all Governor in Council appointees.

There's a team of people who are expert at dealing with all issues around appointments, reappointments, issues of tenure and issues that you might think of as HR issues in that space. Certainly there, more than anywhere else in the Government of Canada, there is actually expertise with how to deal with issues around executive performance, but also conduct.

If there are problems, PCO is the best place to go to, not just because they're in the centre and play that coordinating role, but they actually have expertise on that senior personnel team because that's part of what they do. They make sure that Governor in Council appointees have gone through a rigorous process to be chosen. Once they are there, if there are any concerns—if there are institutional issues or governance issues relating to executive leaders dealing with boards of directors, for example, or anything like that—they are the people who are best equipped to provide that support.

This is not an area I dealt with a lot, but my understanding is that it does happen, because the number of such Governor in Council appointees is quite significant. In that sense, to the extent there is that expertise, it is located there.

In addition to that, to the extent that there is not a procedure that exists that is a clear answer to what to do next, PCO is also the expert in machinery of government questions and machinery of all types of institutional and organizational questions that you'd want to be mindful of if you are needing to create some kind of process or some kind of system to now investigate something.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

It sounds like it would be standard practice, then.

After you brought these allegations forward to the Privy Council Office, was it your understanding that the clerk would be looking into this, or did he suggest that you bring the issues to the attention of another member of the Privy Council Office?

[Elder Marques]

My recollection is that we had at least two meetings in a row. It was following that second meeting that he indicated specifically that this would be the responsibility of the senior personnel team. I think he probably would have suggested that in the first meeting as well but then wanted to maybe pause and get some advice on that, which he was able to do very quickly, because, as I say, by mid-morning that day it appears we had met at least twice.

That referral probably didn't happen immediately, but it happened very quickly, probably within an hour or two of my first bringing the issue to his attention.

Then I would have dealt directly with Ms. Sherman. There are some emails in the record that are between me and Ms. Sherman, and I would have met with her to discuss the issue.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

It was suggested that you speak with Ms. Sherman.

[Elder Marques]

That's right.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

Can you run us through what happened after it was suggested that you speak with Ms. Sherman?

[Elder Marques]

I can't give you a very specific, exact sequence that I am confident is perfectly reliable, but she made herself available very quickly. We promptly discussed those issues, and then we would have remained in touch. She understood, I think, and you see in our exchanges, that I had a sensitivity to this, frankly, especially as this was a Friday: Let's make sure that we provide, today, an answer to Mr. Walbourne. Even if it's an imperfect or preliminary answer, let's make sure that there's some engagement today.

I believe she had that same view. I think everyone understood that, again, in a situation where you have a person who has an institutional role the way the ombudsman did, who has sort of put up their hand and asked for assistance or whatever the right word is, you want to make sure that gets answered. You don't want that to happen and then there not to be a response, so I think we touched based during that day to make sure that happened.

Ultimately, she provided me with some language, which I then shared with the office of the minister to suggest that this be the language, or something like that, used to give to Mr. Walbourne so that there was kind of a follow-up or a response to his interaction with the minister of the day before.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

All right. Thank you very much.

Mr. Barsalou-Duval, the floor is yours.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Marques, you said earlier that, although you had no details, you knew that the allegation was serious. In fact, according to the information we have today, we know that it was particularly serious.

Would you say that the Privy Council Office failed in not managing to shed light on the matter?

[Elder Marques]

Let me say two things. First, on this point about the seriousness and what we know now and didn't know then, at the time I was involved, all we knew was that there was a person with a complaint. We didn't know what that meant. We didn't know anything about the nature of that, or the details of that or the seriousness of it.

As I said before, we were treating it as if it was very serious. I don't think if—

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you.

But you were in the position until 2019; thereafter, if I am not mistaken, you had no news. You said that it was your impression that the case was open. As you had no news about the case and the case was about a serious allegation, did you not want to follow up on it?

[Elder Marques]

Listen, as I indicated before, I think everyone who was aware that someone had raised something—not even knowing what it was, but that someone had raised something—would want the outcome to be that whatever that is gets properly looked at, absolutely. I think everyone shares that. I don't think that's a partisan issue. I think that's a pretty straightforward “do the right thing” issue, which is that somebody is saying there's a problem, so let's investigate it—

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

So would you agree that the case was not dealt with appropriately?

[Elder Marques]

I certainly agree that the outcome of the issue not being looked at is not what anybody would have wanted at the time, either then or in hindsight. What I think is important to consider is what options were available at that time to actually do anything in addition to what was done. I think what changes could be made, either institutionally or otherwise, so that in future that outcome could be different....

Again, that's why the work the committee is doing is hugely important. I hope—and I am confident that it is, based on the members' questions to me, certainly—it's with the lens of ensuring several things. The first is that these things don't happen at all, and that if they do happen, there's always a proper system to do it—a system that survivors can be confident in and feel confident participating in. That, in a way, is a different question from—

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

I would like to ask you one more question.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Your time is up, Mr. Barsalou-Duval.

We will go on to Mr. Garrison, please.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Mr. Marques, I want to return to the question of what was known at the time. You've just restated things, leaving out, I think, critical detail: that is, not just that people knew there was a serious allegation, but you confirmed to me that you knew there was evidence connected to that allegation that the minister, for whatever reason, didn't look at and that the Privy Council Office did not get access to.

Is that correct?

[Elder Marques]

I certainly didn't mean to restate things in some way that changes that. You are right that I understood at that time that Mr. Walbourne had more that he wanted to say. What that more was, I don't know and I don't think anybody knew at the time.

I think what you see by focusing Mr. Walbourne on dealing with the Privy Council Office is precisely an attempt to understand what that more is, or at least understand enough about it, maybe still in an anonymous form or in some other way, but enough about it to be able to develop or point him in the right direction, and a direction that would permit that to be investigated, or if necessary, take some other steps to investigate it. That is hard to do if you don't have that information.

I agree with you that getting that information was important. That is reflected in what, from what I see, certainly looking back, I think the Privy Council was trying to do.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

It's also clear from Mr. Walbourne's testimony that he was offering an anonymous version of that evidence to both the minister and the Privy Council Office.

I want to turn, then, to your reporting relationship to the Prime Minister's chief of staff. Would you, or did you—I guess I can say that and see if you have the recall, and I acknowledge that it was three years ago—let the Prime Minister's chief of staff know that there was that “more” involved in these allegations? Would you have passed that information, or do you remember if you did pass that information, to the Prime Minister's chief of staff?

[Elder Marques]

I don't have a perfect recollection. I am confident that the first time we would have discussed this issue in full, either with my having spoken to the minister's chief or with Ms. Telford having spoken to the minister's chief, we exchanged all the information we knew at that time.

I am confident that at that time I would have relayed to her what the chief of staff had told me. Frankly, if she'd had the conversation, I'm confident she would have relayed to me the entirety of that as well. It's an unusual situation, but it wouldn't have been difficult to recount all of that information.

I'm confident we would have, because we both would have been immediately in the mode of trying to make sure that we get this into the right place, that we get an investigation going and that it goes to PCO: We don't know anything more than PCO does; let's make sure that they are fully engaged.

That was my headspace as I went to talk to the clerk and as I dealt with Ms. Sherman, and to the extent that I may have dealt with others, it was always to ensure that we do not somehow possess some information that could be relevant.

Even though we didn't have a lot of information, we made sure all of it was given to PCO. We were certainly expecting, and I think rightly so, and with no reason to doubt that they would, that they would be then following up and have full carriage of the matter.