http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/story.html?id=4abd4f8f-7d95-4be8-bf7d-d89b20cbca59&k=1213
Tories amend accountability act to rewrite law they're accused of breaking
Bruce Cheadle, Canadian Press
Published: Saturday, November 18, 2006
OTTAWA (CP) - The Conservative government is proposing to open a loophole in its vaunted accountability act by declaring that party convention fees not be counted as political contributions under the law.
The issue is a sensitive one for the Conservative party, which is under investigation by Elections Canada for failing to declare almost $2 million in fees paid by delegates to the party's 2005 convention.
In a government order paper posted Friday without fanfare, the Conservatives appear to tacitly concede they were wrong when they claimed there was no need to declare the fees more than a year ago.
They now want to change the accountability act to add that "payment . . . of a fee to participate in a registered party's convention is not a contribution" as long as the fees don't exceed the cost of running the convention.
That's the same argument the party made in June when it vehemently claimed it was following existing campaign financing laws when it failed to declare as much as $1.7 million in fees from its March 2005 convention.