SNC lobbyist attended Liberal donor events

No rules broken, but critics blast cash-for-access

OTTAWA •A lobbyist for Snc-lavalin and former Liberal adviser attended two exclusive donor events hosted by the party at the same time the Quebec engineering giant was lobbying Ottawa for a negotiated settlement to avoid a criminal trial, despite steps the Liberal Party has taken to end the controversial practice of cash-foraccess fundraising.

Bruce Hartley, who has been registered as a lobbyist for Snc-lavalin since April 2017, attended two events for deep-pocketed donors in December 2017 and June 2018, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was the featured guest.

Also in attendance at both events were Finance Minister Bill Morneau, former principal secretary Gerald Butts, Trudeau’s chief of staff Katie Telford, and Mathieu Bouchard, Trudeau’s adviser on Quebec issues, all key players in the controversy over allegations of political interference that has consumed the Trudeau government over the last month.

Hartley’s attendance did not explicitly break Liberal Party fundraising rules, but critics say it shows that cash-foraccess is still on offer for those donors who can afford it.

Hartley, a former top aide to prime minister Jean Chrétien who now works for lobbying firm Prospectus, said he did not discuss SNCLavalin at the events, and said he attended as a Liberal Party member. He is registered to lobby on behalf of Snc-lavalin, but is not listed in the public lobbying registry as having conducted any official meetings with the government on behalf of the company.

In 2017, the Liberals put in place new rules for their fundraising events meant to increase transparency, following revelations that the party had been raising millions of dollars through private fundraisers that gave wealthy donors access to Trudeau and his cabinet ministers behind closed doors.

Since then, Liberal fundraisers have been advertised in advance and conducted in publicly accessible spaces, and media can attend. The party also publishes reports on fundraisers after the fact, including guest lists.

Further, the party says it vets guest lists in advance to ensure that anyone registered to lobby the featured guest at fundraisers does not attend.

However, that rule only applies to certain types of fundraisers — not to the donorappreciation events Hartley attended in 2017 and 2018.

“For two years now, the Liberal Party has been the first and only party to move forward with the strongest standards in federal politics for open and transparent political fundraising events,” Liberal Party spokesperson Braeden Caley told the Post in an email.

Snc-lavalin launched a multi-year lobbying campaign after the company was charged in 2015 with paying $48 million in bribes to Libyan government officials between 2001 and 2011. If convicted, it would face a 10-year ban on federal contracts.

The company has lobbied extensively on the issue, including meetings with Morneau, Butts, Bouchard, Privy Council clerk Michael Wernick, and even Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh.

The two fundraising events Hartley attended in December 2017 and June 2018 were donor-appreciation events for Laurier Club members — donors who give at least $1,500 annually to the party. According to Elections Canada, Hartley has donated $10,678 to the federal party since 2006, and another $2,028 to riding associations and a leadership campaign.

Hartley told the Post that he signed an affirmation required by the party stating he would not lobby at the event. “I attended to support the Liberal Party of Canada as I have consistently done over the past several decades,” he said in an email.

NDP ethics critic Charlie Angus said the Snc-lavalin controversy is revealing “the really tawdry little backroom world of influence that exists in the Trudeau government.”

He suggested that despite the Liberals’ commitment to end controversial cash-foraccess fundraisers, the practice continues.

“They got called out for shamelessly peddling access to the prime minister. They came up with what looked like some rules, but in reality if you give an enormous amount of money to the Liberal party, you get access because you’re special,” he said. “That’s the kind of insider access that got this government into trouble.”

However, Caley argued the Conservatives and NDP haven’ t willingly put in place the same transparency measures the Liberals have adopted. The government passed new political fundraising legislation last year that came into effect in December, which requires the opposition parties to disclose details about fundraising events where a donation of more than $200 is required to attend.

But the legislation does not require all parties to allow media to attend their events, as the Liberals have done. “It’s time that both Mr. Scheer and Mr. Singh did the right thing and stopped barring journalists from their parties’ behindclosed-doors fundraising events,” Caley said.