Ex-Privy Council clerk not interviewed by RCMP in SNC-Lavalin probe

Article content

OTTAWA – The former clerk of the Privy Council says he was never interviewed by the RCMP in their investigation of the SNC-Lavalin affair, which concluded with the force declining to lay any charges.

Former clerk Michael Wernick testified before the House of Commons ethics committee on Tuesday and said he was not interviewed as part of the RCMP’s investigation into whether the Prime Minister Justin Trudeau broke the law.

Article content

Article content

Wernick said he was interviewed by the ethics commissioner and by RCMP in connection to a possible investigation about lobbying, but not about the issue of whether Trudeau interfered in the investigation.

Wernick was clerk during the SNC-Lavalin scandal in 2018, when former attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould said she felt pressured by Wernick to intervene in the company’s criminal case. Wernick was among several people that the prime minister dispatched to try to find a resolution for the company with Wilson-Raybould over corruption charges that SNC-Lavalin was facing.

Trudeau pushed Wilson-Raybould to consider a deferred prosecution agreement for the company. A deferred prosecution agreement is a legal process that allows companies to avoid criminal prosecution in exchange for taking certain steps, often paying large fines or providing restitution.

She was later moved in cabinet to the veterans’ affairs portfolio, and then ultimately forced out of cabinet entirely when she went public with her complaints.

SNC-Lavalin, which has since changed its name to AtkinsRéalis, ultimately pleaded guilty to lesser charges and paid a $280-million fine, but avoided the 10-year ban on bidding on public contracts it faced if convicted on the original charges.

Article content

Article content

Then ethics commissioner Mario Dion found Trudeau had violated ethics laws by pressuring Wilson-Rayboud to consider a deferred prosecution agreement for the company. The RCMP recently revealed that it chose not to pursue a criminal investigation, without having interviewed Trudeau.

Wernick, who left his post in 2019, said he never directed the RCMP to do anything during his time as clerk. He said the RCMP may have chosen a different path because the police force requires different standards than the ethics commissioner.

“The ethics commissioner’s mandate given to it by Parliament is about violations of conflict of interest and the RCMP will be looking at a threshold of potential violations of criminal laws — they will be looking at it with a different lens,” he said.

The RCMP also didn’t obtain a search warrant for privileged cabinet documents about the decision.

Conservative MP Michael Barrett said Trudeau should have fully disclosed all the cabinet records to the RCMP and suggested to Wernick that the Prime Minister’s Office was perpetrating a coverup.

Article content

“We don’t know because the executive has used their power, the prime minister has used his power to shield himself from effective investigation by police,” he said. “Ms. Wilson-Raybould didn’t do what she was supposed to do in the prime minister’s estimation and she was kicked out of cabinet.”

Wernick said Barrett was making one interpretation, but not the correct one.

“Another narrative would be that the maximum pressure put on the attorney general was to provide reasoning and rationale why she declined to use the tool, an entirely legal tool that was provided by cabinet, the deferred prosecution agreement,” he said.

Wernick said his only advice for the government now was to better define the circumstances where a deferred prosecution agreement can be used.

National Post
rtumilty@postmedia.com

Our website is the place for the latest breaking news, exclusive scoops, longreads and provocative commentary. Please bookmark nationalpost.com and sign up for our politics newsletter, First Reading, here.

Article content