Public Accounts Committee on Sept. 18th, 2024

[Witness 1]

That's correct. The reporting showed that the deputy minister and the ADM had plans to speak to the minister about the findings, at which point, the following week, everything suddenly changed and now they needed more time, an expansion of timing.

I myself was personally given the full verbal debrief by RCGT over a two-hour period on exactly what the findings were at that point.

Again, I want to mention that the 37 hours I'm talking about, this isn't.... They integrated me into every aspect of the investigation. I don't know why, but they did, so in the information I'm providing, I'm factually telling the truth because it's all validated.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you.

The minister never mentioned anything about an interim report. He never mentioned anything about being briefed in May or June. He led a parliamentary committee to believe that he first learned about the findings of wrongdoing in September, and you said nearly a year ago that he lied. I presume it was in that context that you said he lied. Is that correct?

[Witness 1]

It's that part, and the part about the fact that he said he had no say in that final recommendation. However, there's evidence to the contrary, showing that before he was actually given the recommendation, he and his office had verbal conversations with the ADM and the deputy minister to ask for changes on those reports and the recommendation prior to its official submission.

I would also say that the most indicative aspect of the situation in the cover-up is the fact that the deputy minister is actually retiring.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

In short, the minister was in the thick of it. He was actively involved. He was learning about information around wrongdoing. He was being briefed, and he was actively, along with his deputy minister, involved in saying that they wanted to change this, and they wanted to change that, and they wanted to soften the report throughout until it was released in October.

Is that a fair characterization of what happened?

[Witness 1]

That's fair. It's not just the minister. It's PCO and the Department of Justice. Again, there were implications immediately when the investigation started in March, because these were PCO appointees.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Who in PCO and Justice was involved in this corrupt editing process, along with the minister?

[Witness 1]

ADMs.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

What about ADM Noseworthy?

[Witness 1]

No. He wasn't involved in any of the investigation because he was implicated. What I meant was that ADMs and people of that level as counterparts to the people at ISED were involved from day one.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Would it be fair to characterize the conduct of the minister as corrupt?

[Witness 1]

Yeah—I mean, embarrassing, at minimum.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Deceitful?

[Witness 1]

Yes.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

You also said last year, and today, that there was a consensus among bureaucrats at ISED that the board needed to go, but that changed when the minister intervened.

Why did Minister Champagne go against the advice of his officials and politically interfere to keep in place the SDTC board, the conflicted board, which had doled out hundreds of millions of dollars improperly?

[Witness 1]

It's because I think the current government is more interested in protecting themselves and protecting the situation being a public nightmare. They would rather protect wrongdoers and financial mismanagement than have to deal with a situation like SDTC in the public sphere.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Cooper.

Mr. Weiler, you're up for five minutes, please.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I do want to thank our witness for coming to our committee today to speak on this very serious matter.

My first question is this. Did you provide your 300 pages of documents to the Auditor General when you first reached out to her office last year?

[Witness 1]

Yes, I did. I'm sorry; it was not last year, but December 2022.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you for that.

Have you or any of the other whistle-blowers spoken to the AG's office since your last appearance in Parliament, in December of last year? Did you provide her office with any complaints and supporting documents?

[Witness 1]

Yes, we gave them all the recordings to validate the situation. They have the recordings and all the documents they requested.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you.

Do you believe there was criminal wrongdoing at SDTC? I ask because parliamentarians have looked to push the RCMP to open a criminal investigation into the allegations. The OAG has the authority to refer evidence of criminality to the RCMP. As of late July, the RCMP confirmed that the Auditor General has not referred any evidence to the RCMP, leading us to consider that there may be no evidence of criminal wrongdoing.

I'm wondering if you would care to comment on this.

[Witness 1]

I think the Auditor General's investigation was more of a cursory review. I don't think the goal and mandate of the Auditor General's office is to actually look into criminality, so I'm not surprised by the fact that they haven't found anything criminal. They're not looking at intent. If their investigation was focused on intent, of course they would find the criminality. They were just focused on the facts of what happened: Here was the financial mismanagement; here were all the rules that were or weren't followed.

I know that the federal government, like the minister, has continued saying that there was no criminal intent and nothing was found, but I think the committee would agree that they're not to be trusted on this situation. I would happily agree to whatever the findings are by the RCMP, but I would say that I wouldn't trust that there isn't any criminality unless the RCMP is given full authority to investigate. Unlike the Auditor General and the sorts of requirements they have for an investigation, the McCarthy Tétrault or the RCGT one was not legally binding. It wasn't obligating the SDTC, the board members or anyone else to actually provide some sort of consent or waiver that obligates them to tell the truth.

Again, if you bring in the RCMP and they do their investigation and they find something or they don't, I think the public would be happy with that. I don't think we should leave it to the current federal government or the ruling party to make those decisions. Let the public see what's there.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Do you believe that the RCMP doesn't have authority to investigate in this matter?

[Witness 1]

No, I definitely believe they have authority.