Angry in the Great White North

From the Montreal Gazette, by Peter O'Neil of the Vancouver Sun:

The Paul Martin government, bracing last fall for Justice John Gomery's scathing sponsorship scandal report and a possible snap election, played down opposition questions suggesting the emergence of another potentially explosive federal ethics controversy.

The questions related to media coverage of an obscure government employee named Frank Brazeau, suspended after contracting irregularities were uncovered by auditors for KPMG - an international accounting company - including contracts improperly let to the family company of Quebec Liberal MP David Smith.

The documents, and subsequent interviews, show the issues linked to Brazeau triggered two police investigations since 2004, $655,000 worth of forensic reviews by KPMG Canada, and a number of disciplinary actions against federal bureaucrats -including three firings.

Three firings? Should I hazard a guess and say at least one of those firings was Bill McCann? Was another Louis Vadeboncoeur?

But what of Brazeau?

The first two KPMG reviews looked at 89 Brazeau-managed contracts valued at $15 million from March 2001 to March 31, 2005.

KPMG uncovered "systemic" and "egregious" rule-breaking as well as a "conflict of interest" at Brazeau's unit at CAC, the documents show.

There was "evidence of manipulation of procurement process, including apparent manipulation of evaluations," as well as "evidence that in three cases contractors were directed to submit false or misleading invoices," according to one summary of the KPMG reports looking into contracts managed by Brazeau, a "principal consultant" at CAC.

KPMG concluded there was a "referral process to (a) specific contractor." It also cited an individual or firm "used as a conduit for contracting with retired public servants." The conduit's identity was whited out because of Privacy Act considerations.

White out -- that's nice. Wouldn't it be a shock to find out that the conduit was Abotech run by Frank Brazeau's cousin David Smith, who was a high-ranking public servant with Public Works for many years? A guy who probably knew a lot of retired public servants like himself?

Now remember how the Ethics Commissioner decided that David Smith had never acted unethically? Moreover, that during his "investigation", the Ethics Commissioner did not uncover the fact that David Smith and Frank Brazeau were cousins?

I knew they were cousins. I reported it on this blog. I also sent an email to the Ethics Commissioner after the investigation was announced, though apparently that was ignored.

But apparently, this was not news. If the Ethics Commissioner had accessed the KPMG investigation into Abotech as part of his investigation, he would have known this:

Among the contracts looked at by KPMG were 15 - valued at a total of $1 million - that went to the family company of Liberal MP Smith.

Public Works wasn't aware until the KPMG probes that Brazeau and Smith are cousins who grew up together in the same small Outaouais town of Maniwaki, and that Brazeau was secretary of Smith's Liberal riding association from December 2004 to August 2005, according to department spokesperson Pierre Teotonio. [emphasis added]

Interesting stuff. First, it would suggest that Frank Brazeau was seriously cooking the books, and that his cousin's company profited from that quite handsomely. Maybe David Smith did not act unethically, but it is unconscionable that the Ethics Commissioner did not figure out the close family relationship between these two men as part of his investigation into the David Smith's ethical behaviour.

Actually it was a case of willful blindness:

Finally, the Ethics Commissioner cannot render findings in relation to the issuance of the sole-source contracts by Consulting and Audit Canada and Abotech Inc. since these events all occurred prior to the Member from Pontiac being elected to the House of Commons and before the Code came into force on October 4, 2004. The Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons does not have a retroactive affect.

But the fact that they are cousins was true after David Smith became an MP. Obviously, this aspect of the law is too subtle for me to understand.

But back to the big picture. Public Works Minister Scott Brison lied on the floor of the House of Commons, or just came up short of lying by a hair's breadth:

Former Liberal Public Works minister Scott Brison insisted the internal KPMG probe was "not an audit" but, in fact, part of an "ongoing ... review" to improve accountability and competition in government operations.

"It is important to note that ... value was received for tax dollars," Brison assured B.C. MP James Moore in October, adding Brazeau had been disciplined.

But a series of documents, requested by the Vancouver Sun on Oct. 3 and provided a week after the January federal election, paint a far more dramatic picture about how seriously Ottawa was taking the emerging scandal.

"Prompt action is critical - Gomery findings due Nov. 1," declared a Sept. 27, 2005, internal document that urged measures to "pre-empt" negative fallout.

[That] document suggested CAC's dismantling should be a key component of a "communications strategy" to deal with fallout from the KPMG results.

But the Liberals played down the move, burying it in an Oct. 21 news release unveiling a new policy on government auditing. It said only that Ottawa was "realigning the functions" of CAC by having Public Works take over the function of hiring outside consultants.

"Realigning" a hotbed of borderline criminal activity that included one of the Liberal Party's own MP's? Just how many more examples of outright theft and graft have been successfully swept under the carpet over the last twelve years?

I'd like to think I helped keep this one example out in the open, at least long enough for the media to get some traction on it. Media types like Peter O'Neil, who obviously did not think this story was to be forgotten. Peter and I spoke on the phone on the preparation of his story. I helped Peter with the background, and with navigating the long list of Abotech posts on this blog, helping him identify the key pieces.

Peter has written to me: "Steve, your site was incredibly useful in helping me get a full picture of this emerging and very complex story, and helped fill in many of the holes in the documents I got through ATIP. I probably never would have discovered, for instance, that Brazeau and Smith are cousins."

I think it is important to highlight that Peter has been working on this story for many months, actually slightly longer than me.

And one more comment from Peter that certain readers should take note: "I think you are a formidable and dogged researcher and, as I've said to you privately, I think you should be able to find work at one of the research offices on Parliament Hill." Interested parties can email me. I am available to start immediately.

I think Peter did a bang-up job, and his revelations concerning the way the Liberal government was deliberately down-playing the story makes me wonder if the new government has assigned enough people to cleaning up the messes the Liberals have left behind.