National Post (National Edition)
STOFFER DENIES SEX MISCONDUCT ALLEGATIONS
NDP never investigated Parliament’s ‘most collegial’ MP over accusations
The wide corridors that run along two sides of the House of Commons are a secure area in the Centre Block of Ottawa’s Parliament Buildings, restricted to Members of Parliament and staff.
One afternoon in 2009 during parliament’s fall session, Lauren DobsonHughes, a young female staffer for then-New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton, was standing in the opposition lobby at the desk of the whip’s assistant when Peter Stoffer, the NDP member for a suburban Halifax riding and one of the most popular MPs, started asking her questions.
Then, according to DobsonHughes’ allegations, he made a sudden move. “He pulled me really close and groped my waist and then kissed me so hard right on my cheek near my mouth that it left saliva drooling down my cheek,” Dobson-Hughes told the National Post.
“I felt awful. I felt so shaky, gross. But nobody batted an eyelid, there must have been, I don’t know, 10 other MPs in that space at the time, with senior staff.”
According to Dobson-Hughes, it was the second time Stoffer had forced a kiss on her.
Two former NDP MPs confirmed to the Post that they handled complaints against Stoffer.
“There was always rumours of Peter being overly friendly,” Dawn Black, then a B.C. MP told the Post. “Lauren is not the only one who raised this.”
The Post has, in fact, spoken to three women who independently said Stoffer acted inappropriately with them.
While others had complained of Stoffer’s behavior towards women, and though it created concerns with some senior party officials — concerns which went all the way up to Layton and the NDP’s caucus chair — there appears never to have been a workplace investigation into Stoffer’s conduct, nor did the NDP take any formal disciplinary measures against him. He maintained his status as an icon of the party even after his defeat in the 2015 federal election, which ended his nearly two decades as an MP.
Stoffer, speaking to the Post Thursday, categorically denied any past sexually inappropriate behaviour.
“None of the allegations you indicated had happened, that I recall,” Stoffer said. “I can assure you I’ve never assaulted anybody, sexually or any way in any shape or form in my life.”
If a cultural shift is underway on Parliament Hill regarding how reports of sexual harassment and assault are treated, the story of how Dobson-Hughes’s complaint was handled offers a case study in the way things used to be done — perhaps sometimes still are — and what repercussions those decisions can have.
The machinery of partisan politics, and the overwhelming concern with protecting the image of the party and its prominent members can interfere with the handling of allegations, even among those who profess the most progressive politics.
“My story is not especially unique or shocking on Parliament Hill,” said DobsonHughes. “Many women under 30 would have had a very similar experience or worse.
“It’s the setting. All political parties on the inside act in a cult-like way in the way they enforce loyalty.”
As Judy Wasylycia-Leis, another former NDP MP, told the Post: “We like to call ourselves the social justice party, but we face the same problems as everyone else. This is the farthest thing from a partisan issue.”
Jagmeet Singh, leader of the NDP, said the allegations “deeply disturbed” him.
“I believe the women who’ve come forward and I want to acknowledge their courage and strength. It’s clear our anti-harassment policies and protections for workers were insufficient and failed to appropriately deal with this behaviour.”
Stoffer, 62, a Dutch-born former airline worker and union activist from the Halifax suburb of Fall River, was elected to federal office in 1997, the first of five-consecutive electoral wins.
He was exceptionally popular among his colleagues. His office on Parliament Hill was a legendary hangout spot, a den furnished with a pool table and dartboard. Beer was always close to hand; Stoffer often offered alcohol to visitors, imploring them to kick back and relax, which Stoffer acknowledged.
In Maclean’s magazine’s Parliamentarian of the Year awards, voted on by MPs, Stoffer was perennially named “Most Collegial.” Of the eight editions of the awards while he was in office, the only time he didn’t win was the year he instead won the overall award of “Parliamentarian of the Year.”
In the 2014 write-up on the awards, Maclean’s called him “Parliament’s nice guy,” saying he was “famous for just being so darn nice” and for “( joking) around with parliamentary pages.” The Hill Times named him “Most Fun MP to Work For” numerous times in their annual survey.
Stoffer’s casual amiableness made him an important part of the NDP’s move toward a wider public appeal. As they made the jump under Layton from an also-ran party with a few dozen MPs to over 100 and official opposition status in the 2011 election, some in the party saw him as someone who helped the party appear normal and mainstream.
By then, however, some women had long held a different view of Stoffer’s fraternization.
“He’d always ask creepy questions — about my engagement ring, my sex life, insinuating kind of creepy questions about marital status, boyfriends, men, sex kind of questions,” said Dobson-Hughes.
The first incident with Stoffer, she said, was at a parliamentary reception in West Block in the fall of 2006, her first year on the Hill. As people mingled at the reception, Stoffer grabbed her and pulled her close, groped her waist and, unprompted and unwanted, kissed her, she said.
Stoffer said he has no recollection of that, saying: “That I would be completely unaware of and no, that never would have happened.”
At the time, Black, then the NDP’s defence critic, was Dobson-Hughes’s boss. She confirmed to the Post that DobsonHughes came to her with a complaint of inappropriate behaviour against Stoffer. Black said she believed her.
Black said she took the complaint about Stoffer to the party leader’s office.
“I didn’t do it on the phone, I didn’t do it on email, I went in person,” Black said. “I was taking this to the leader.” She doesn’t recall specific details of a conversation. However, she said she was left with one impression: “I don’t think anyone was so shocked.”
Black was disappointed in how the leader handled the complaint, she told the Post last week. Instead of dealing with it directly, she said, Layton’s office asked Wasylycia-Leis, the NDP caucus chair at the time, to speak to Stoffer.
Wasylycia-Leis confirmed that as caucus chair she had several concerns raised to her informally about Stoffer’s inappropriate behaviour — although she could not recall whether the concerns were specific. She confirmed she personally raised the issue with him at the time.
“I did take Peter aside and told him, ‘You’re a friendly guy and you may think you’re being friendly but you need to reassess the way you interact with people because it may not leave the right impression,’” Wasylycia-Leis said. “As far as I can remember, there was no grievance brought forward, but back in those days it was a concern.”
Stoffer doesn’t remember that. “To be frank with you, I don’t recall it at all,” he said.
Black said it would have been more meaningful had Layton issued a warning, or taken disciplinary action.
“It’s kind of ironic, isn’t it, that I took it to the leader’s office and then it’s a woman who has to go and talk to him,” Black said. “I kind of expected at the time that one of them would talk to him. (Instead) they get the women to deal with it.”
Dobson-Hughes said she appreciated the support of the women in the party’s caucus but is angry over the lack of a formal intervention.
“This isn’t about Peter Stoffer particularly, this is about senior female MPs taking a complaint directly to the leader and that still isn’t enough to do anything about it — political reputation still trumps the safety of women in the workplace,” said DobsonHughes. “Until very recently, parties didn’t prioritize this as an issue. Electoral chances are much more important.”
Bob Gallagher, who was Layton’s chief of staff at the time, said he doesn’t remember hearing complaints like that against Stoffer.
“I am very much encouraged by the trend we have been seeing of women finding the courage to come forward,” Gallagher said. “Something this serious I am certain I would remember. Hence I don’t believe it came to me.
“It is very true that Mr. Stoffer was a very gregarious, loud and politically incorrect character. The characterization of him as ‘overly friendly’ rings true to me. If you have someone alleging these things I would believe her, but I do not have any memory of being party to the discussions. I also know both Judy and Dawn to be totally honest and straightforward, I would not for a moment doubt their memories or judgment.”
When Stoffer was asked whether his legendary friendliness and easy access to beer might have led to some misunderstandings, he said it was possible.
“It may be so, but none of the allegations you indicated had happened, that I recall,” Stoffer said.
By 2009, Dobson-Hughes was herself working in Layton’s office. Working for the party leader required access to the secure House of Commons lobby. That’s where Stoffer again groped and kissed her, she said. This time, however, she didn’t press a complaint.
“I didn’t tell anyone because it was witnessed,” she said. “I think they just thought it was normal.” The leader’s office, she said, was “a macho shop.”
None of the MPs or party staff who witnessed the incident followed up with her about it, she said.
When told of the allegation, Stoffer said: “No I don’t recall any of that, my friend, to be frank with you.”
Stoffer served as an MP until losing his seat in the 2015 federal election, as Justin Trudeau’s Liberals swept every seat in Atlantic Canada.
Shortly before, in 2014, a current NDP staff member told the Post she was invited to socialize in Stoffer’s office after a reception. People were playing pool when she arrived.
Stoffer, she said, “pulled me to the side and said, ‘Just sit here on the edge of the pool table’ while the other guy was shooting, ‘I want you to distract him.’” She said it was her worst experience on the Hill: “I felt dirty and cheap and really gross after that comment, and I just left.
“These are people that you work with and trust and you don’t expect people to treat you that way.”
About a year after Stoffer’s electoral defeat, a woman volunteering for a current NDP MP attended a party event in Ottawa. The woman spoke to the Post on condition her name not be revealed for fear of damaging her standing within the party. The Post knows her name and confirmed her identity.
After the event, several attendees went to an Ottawa bar. Stoffer arrived with another woman who was in her early 20s, the woman said.
“He was buying both of us (the two women) drinks all night long, and he was just very flirtatious,” the woman said. As he drank he acted increasingly “lewd,” she said.
The woman left with her boyfriend at the same time Stoffer left with his partner that night. “He had linked arms with me on one side and that girl on the other side. Then he was like, ‘You want to have a threesome with us, don’t you?’ And I’m like, ‘No. No.’ I went to take my arm out from being linked to his, and he kind of tightened his elbow into his body so it was harder for me to get it out,” she said.
At some point, she said, Stoffer said, “Oh come on, don’t be a bitch.” She pulled away when Stoffer’s grip loosened as her boyfriend approached, she said.
“No, no, no chance at all. That‘s impossible,” Stoffer said of the allegation. “I don’t know where that came from.”
The woman said she told an NDP MP about the incident at the time, and the MP — whom she did not want to identify because the MP is still in office — seemed to brush it off, saying something like: “That’s just Peter, I’m sure he didn’t mean anything by it, he gets like that when he’s drinking.”
The woman thinks Stoffer’s legacy within the party dampened any action or investigation: “Stoffer was a big deal. That’s why it was so devastating when it happened because those are the people that you want to be able to trust.”
Black left federal politics after three terms when she stepped down in 2009. She thought the concerns with Stoffer had been dealt with by the caution issued by WasylyciaLeis, she said.
When told of the other allegations she said, “Oh God, seriously? I’m sorry to hear that.”
In the 1990s, Black was part of an all-party coalition of female MPs who tried to implement sexual harassment policies on the Hill. They met with the Speaker but nothing ended up happening. An election got in the way, she said.
“I’ve been subject to it myself over the years and I understand it and the power imbalance makes it really very difficult for staff on Parliament Hill,” Black said.
Both Black and WasylyciaLeis said sexism and sexual harassment is a problem in all parties and across societal sectors.
“Our party is just a reflection — I think we’re ahead on most things but we’re not perfect, for God’s sake,” Black said.
“It’s not correct to say that people didn’t speak up before, because some of us did, but it was hard to be heard and it was hard to get concrete action put into place — and it’s still not there.”
Singh said he was committed to making things better in his party and for everyone on the Hill.
“We will continue to review, renew and expand our policies regarding harassment at all levels of our organization, including our candidate review process,” he said. “My office will respond to any complaint we receive regardless of when the event occurred.”
I WENT IN PERSON. IWAS TAKING THIS TO THE LEADER.