McGuinty on green leaker

Here’s Liberal Environment Critic David McGuinty (left) responding to today’s developments in the “Green Leak” affair. He is being questioned by several different reporters from different news organizations in a scrum in the House of Commons lobby after Question Period today:

Reporter:   So, Mr. McGuinty, what about the arrest of this Environment Canada employee?  Is this justified?

McGuinty:  Look, it's a very strange set of circumstances. Just 10 days ago at most the Minister of the Environment sent me an eight-page speech to the opposition lobby fax machine.  The elements of that speech were very much the same elements in this so-called secret plan.  Is the Minister of the Environment being investigated by the RCMP?  Are his staff being investigated by the RCMP? It's a bit rich.

Secondly, it's important for us to remember if this person's a whistleblower — for example, let's say this person is saying that I felt an obligation to reveal this document because the government's plan is a breach of international law under the Kyoto Treaty – which the government's plan is.  If the person was acting in good faith that way, had there been an actual commissioner of the kind that the government created — the post that we created collectively as Parliament, the one that Gwyn Morgan was supposed to fill, if that position had been filled, maybe the individual would have gone to that person instead to find out what his options could have been. 

But the heavy hammer here is very suspicious.  As a former criminal lawyer, it's very, very strange to see that someone's hauled away in handcuffs at seven o'clock in the morning in front of their workmates to be then released only an hour or so later, to be told they're not even being charged.  Then of course the charges that are levelled are the wrong ones because the RCMP says that he's being apparently charged under the Criminal Code for breach of trust for revealing detailed regulations.  That wasn't the case at all. 

Question:   Is the RCMP becoming a de facto arm of the PMO?

McGuinty:   You know that's a very tough question.  I know that the RCMP are now increasingly trying to keep, for example, the media away from ministers, media away from press conferences, the media corralled until official meetings are over.  That's not the common practice of the RCMP. I'm sure the RCMP themselves are uncomfortable fulfilling that function.  So, you know, is the RCMP basically here just an organ of the state so to speak at the beck and call?  That's a question for the prime minister.

Reporter:   Do you think there should be radical activists in the civil service who openly criticize the prime minister and his policies?

McGuinty:   I think that there should be a balance here and I think that the public servants that are there, that are doing their job, hundreds of thousands of them are doing their job well.  If they have a beef or a gripe there should be some kind of place to go.  The government still hasn't filled — the government still hasn't filled the whistleblowing commissioner's job. They tried to shove Gwyn Morgan down Parliament's throat.  We all said no because he's a Tory bagman and he's too close to the prime minister. I gave the prime minister an option.  I said give us five days, we'll give you five more names with all-party agreement.  He still hasn't filled the position. If the position were filled, maybe a public servant would feel comfortable going to that position and saying I have a problem.