Jean Brault, the former head of Groupaction Marketing, testified before the Gomery Inquiry last week. His testimony has implicated the Liberal party in a kickback scheme. Government advertising in Quebec — sponsorship money — was awarded to his company. In return he put Liberal operatives on the payroll, paid people for fictitious work, and made contributions to the Liberal party.
Groupaction took in about $60 million in contracts, kicked back about $1.5 million to the Liberals, and Brault paid himself around $6 million.
Brault favours Quebec independence. His testimony has brought that issue back. The Quebec provincial Parti Québécois (PQ) smells a dream scenario emerging from the kickback revelations. The federal Liberals fall to the Bloc Québécois in Quebec, and lose support in the country. A Conservative government is formed in Ottawa, and the PQ win an election over the unpopular Jean Charest government, and call the third referendum on sovereignty.
They win the sovereignty vote because federalism has become synonymous with the Liberals who are down — and out. The Conservatives are ineffective in defending Canada. Soft Quebec nationalists go over to the sovereignty camp.
No party has effectively addressed the real issues behind the sponsorship scandal. The Liberals say they were at war with sovereigntists and had to use all means to combat the enemy. Paul Martin and his handlers say his task is to punish the war profiteers, and achieve vindication for his party. Martin scrubs the Liberals clean or something to that effect.
In fact it was witless Martin who created the conditions whereby the sovereigntists almost won the 1995 referendum, which then encouraged the Jean Chrétien people to roll out the sponsorship scheme, giving party “friends” a chance to scam the public.
By cutting back on unemployment insurance and transfers for health, welfare and post-secondary education in his 1995 budget, Martin cut the real ties that bind Canadians to each other and — not incidentally — Quebec citizens of Canada to Canada. All the flags and branded events in the world are not worth an unemployment insurance fund that was financed by Canadians and taken away from Canadians who needed it by Paul Martin.
Giving the Bloc and the PQ the issue of planned cutbacks to unemployment insurance just in time to fight the 1995 referendum changed the direction of Canadian politics. Thanks to the UI cuts the Bloc has been able to enjoy continued success. Lest it be forgotten, it was the Bloc that showed how the so-called deficit was being reduced by stealing about $10 billion a year from UI premiums. There lies the real scandal.
The Conservatives so want to show the public that the important public scandals are not in corporate crime but in government that they fail to note Groupaction is the corporate sector.
Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe is being touted as the next leader of the PQ. Another strong showing in Quebec for the Bloc under his leadership in an election against the Liberals would make him look ready to take on the provincial Liberals. Since both the Jean Charest Liberals and the PQ were clients of Groupaction, Duceppe as the man who revealed the scandal could sensibly take his rewards — first the leadership of the PQ, then the premiership.
It is hard to judge how much the electoral fortunes of the NDP have been affected by the scandal. But rather than throw mud, the party should be talking about the role the Liberals have played in cutting the ties that bind Canadians, and about how to rebuild the social infrastructure of the country starting with unemployment insurance.
The bickering and controversy started by the Brault testimony (he was contradicted by the next witness) coupled with the incompetence of Mr. Justice John Gomery (he selected a partisan Conservative as his lead counsel) means there are more war stories to come, and we are unlikely to ever get a clear account of how and where money went missing.
In the meantime, the debate on what it means to be a Canadian and what to expect from government needs to go ahead. So far the stage is wide open. The Conservatives do not believe in government, the Bloc does not believe in Canada, and the Liberals are divided, discredited, and will be defeated in the House when the two other parties so decide.
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