Stephen Harper faced another grilling on the campaign trail Friday about where the buck stops inside the Prime Minister’s Office.
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Alongside the Duffy scandal that is implicating more and more staff from the Prime Minister’s Office, the Conservatives have faced allegations that Tory Senator Don Meredith pursued a sexual relationship with a teenage girl that began when she was 16.
As scandals around the Senate and PMO continue to mount, Harper remained bullish in front of his cheering supporters, promising to raise the Adoption Expense Tax Credit to $20,000 from the current $15,000 if the Conservatives are re-elected.
At one point, Duffy’s team sought to amend the deal to specify that the matter would never be referred to the RCMP, but the PMO demurred, saying legally and politically, they couldn’t commit to that.
The event focused mainly on small business until Harper took questions, where he was peppered over new details in Senator Mike Duffy’s trial. Gerstein also reported that Deloitte’s position was “they were asked to complete the work by the end of March and plan to”.
Wright earlier testified that Novak had only popped in and out of that conversation.
– NDP Leader Tom Mulcair on the prime minister’s vote on confidence in his staff.
It was during that short meeting that Wright told Perrin he would cover Duffy’s expenses. Wright said he believed that he was doing a “good deed” by paying the money back, and that that was one of the reasons he kept it relatively quiet.
“These were actions undertaken by Mr. Wright, by his own admission”, Harper said.
Not that there was anything wrong with that arrangement, Perrin told the court.
“I would point out that there have been a large range of senators appointed by a large range of prime ministers who have had these kinds of difficulties, and that is because of the nature of an institution that is unaccountable”.
“Duffy was considering reneging on his public commitment to repay his disputed expenses, that he continued to believe the rules around claiming the housing allowance were ambiguous and that they were seriously considering going through the audit process to achieve a favourable outcome”, he said. Within days of the conference call, Wright sent along his cheque and Duffy repaid the receiver general. “Let me know if you have any comments”.
“When people are working for me, they have my confidence”.
His every action in court – where he has been indefatigable in Duffy’s defence, objecting frequently, aggressively grilling those witnesses, like Wright, whose evidence could be damaging to his client – suggests a man who isn’t just a hired gun, but a believer. “Duffy’s repayment, that was certainly not going to happen anymore and that he was unable to make that happen”, Mr. Perrin said.
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“I’ve known Ray for 20 years”, Conservative spokesman Kory Teneycke said at the time.
