Kenney accused of misleading the Commons
OTTAWA—Jason Kenney, the Conservative government's attack dog, now finds himself under ethical attack — accused of fabricating the truth just to lash out at the opposition Liberals.
"It's just breathtaking," Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale said yesterday. The opposition wants Kenney's head. "He deliberately misled the House of Commons and he should resign."
The controversy is almost an arcane one, revolving around technical aspects of Canada's access-to-information law and the complex web of daily, intergovernmental emails among bureaucrats and political aides.
But the ongoing furor is being fuelled by the big principles being churned up: privacy, the public's right to scrutinize the government and now, in light of Kenney's attack stance in the Commons this week, truth and lies in the partisan fray.
It starts with a story this week in Montreal's Gazette, which revealed minutes of meetings showing government communication officials bandying about names of reporters who had filed access-to-information requests. This raised fears about a serious violation of the access law: identities of requesters are supposed to be shielded from government scrutiny.
Even worse, copies of these minutes were forwarded to officials in the Prime Minister's Office, including Sandra Buckler, communication director for Stephen Harper.
The government's initial defence was to insist that no political people actually read the reports of these proceedings.
But then Kenney, the Prime Minister's parliamentary secretary, said he had a Privy Council Office memo proving that Liberals had indulged in the same, illegal indiscretion when they were in office. He has now said this at least a half-dozen times in the House of Commons.
Kenney said the Conservatives were actually raising the standards of elected office by stopping the practice immediately. The problem, however, is that the memo says the opposite.
Dale Eisler, assistant secretary to the cabinet and a former journalist, wrote in the memo: "There was no knowledge of an ATI (access-to-information) request by any specific reporter. We are never privy to that information."
The only long-standing practice that Eisler mentions is the actual circulation of the minutes. "These type of summary reports were regularly shared with members of the previous government's communications office."
Susan Delacourt
OTTAWA—Jason Kenney, the Conservative government's attack dog, now finds himself under ethical attack — accused of fabricating the truth just to lash out at the opposition Liberals.
"It's just breathtaking," Liberal House Leader Ralph Goodale said yesterday. The opposition wants Kenney's head. "He deliberately misled the House of Commons and he should resign."
The controversy is almost an arcane one, revolving around technical aspects of Canada's access-to-information law and the complex web of daily, intergovernmental emails among bureaucrats and political aides.
But the ongoing furor is being fuelled by the big principles being churned up: privacy, the public's right to scrutinize the government and now, in light of Kenney's attack stance in the Commons this week, truth and lies in the partisan fray.
It starts with a story this week in Montreal's Gazette, which revealed minutes of meetings showing government communication officials bandying about names of reporters who had filed access-to-information requests. This raised fears about a serious violation of the access law: identities of requesters are supposed to be shielded from government scrutiny.
Even worse, copies of these minutes were forwarded to officials in the Prime Minister's Office, including Sandra Buckler, communication director for Stephen Harper.
The government's initial defence was to insist that no political people actually read the reports of these proceedings.
But then Kenney, the Prime Minister's parliamentary secretary, said he had a Privy Council Office memo proving that Liberals had indulged in the same, illegal indiscretion when they were in office. He has now said this at least a half-dozen times in the House of Commons.
Kenney said the Conservatives were actually raising the standards of elected office by stopping the practice immediately. The problem, however, is that the memo says the opposite.
Dale Eisler, assistant secretary to the cabinet and a former journalist, wrote in the memo: "There was no knowledge of an ATI (access-to-information) request by any specific reporter. We are never privy to that information."
The only long-standing practice that Eisler mentions is the actual circulation of the minutes. "These type of summary reports were regularly shared with members of the previous government's communications office."
Susan Delacourt
