MORNEAU ON THE DEFENSIVE
Tories target minister’s father
Tempers flared Thursday in Parliament as Finance Minister Bill Morneau, furious about his father being dragged into the controversy over his personal finances, accused opposition MPs of stooping to new depths and slandering his family.
Question period became so raucous as accusations were flung across the aisle that Conservative MP Blake Richards — who was heckling Morneau — was ejected by Speaker Geoff Regan and escorted out by the sergeant-at-arms. It marks the first time in 15 years an MP has been temporarily booted out of the House of Commons.
Morneau says the opposition is being wilfully ignorant, and using the legal protection of parliamentary privilege to insinuate he engaged in illegal behaviour. But Morneau also remains reluctant to provide details about his own personal financial decisions.
The commotion was kicked off by a Global News report that Morneau’s father, William F. Morneau Sr., sold a total of 200,000 Morneau Shepell shares in the two weeks leading up to a Dec. 7, 2015, announcement on raising the income tax rate on wealthy Canadians. (The sell-off is documented in regulatory disclosures, as Morneau Sr. is still on the Morneau Shepell board of directors.)
The finance minister himself has been under fire all week over the news he also sold 680,000 Morneau Shepell shares (worth $10 million) a week before the announcement. The Conservatives and NDP argue the news caused the stock market to drop, meaning Morneau saved money by selling the shares before the announcement was made.
Morneau has called the allegations absurd, saying he’d directed his financial adviser to sell the shares shortly after taking office in early November, and that the measures announced were all outlined in the Liberal election platform.
Furthermore, the tax measures were tabled in Parliament at 3:15 p.m. and a media briefing was scheduled a half-hour later, meaning the finance department did not consider it to be marketsensitive information.
Such announcements are made outside of trading hours, which run at the Toronto Stock Exchange from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
“The Department of Finance always gives advice on timing based on whether something is market-moving,” said a spokesperson from Morneau’s office. “And this was tabled at 3:15, well before markets closed. Therefore, it was not deemed to be price-sensitive.”
Morneau also pointed out that the government’s house leader at the time, Dominic LeBlanc, had an interview with the Ottawa Citizen published on Nov. 5, 2015 — a month beforehand — that stated the tax changes were likely to kick in on Jan. 1, 2016, which they ultimately did.
The opposition, however, demanded to know why both Morneau and his father sold their shares when they did.
“It turns out the minister’s father sold $1.5 million worth of shares just four days before the tax announcement that dropped Morneau Shepell share prices,” said Carleton, Ont., Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre. “Is that just a coincidence?”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the question a “slanderous smear job,” but it was Morneau who bristled as the questions kept coming.
“Is it just a coincidence that both he and his father sold millions of dollars worth of shares a week before he introduced tax increases that helped drop their value?” persisted Poilievre.
An angry Morneau, visibly upset that his family had become a target, responded, “I have a level of disgust for what is going on in the other side of the House. I did not know the member from Carleton could sink any lower.”
Later, speaking to reporters, Morneau said the attacks went beyond the usual political sniping.
“In taking on this role, of course I knew there was the potential for personal attacks,” he said. “I’ve got to say, though, I had no idea how slanderous the opposition would be, when they found themselves in a position where our plans were going well for Canadians.”
Pressed by reporters, Morneau said he had never had a discussion with his father about selling his own shares, or divulged any confidential information to his father about the tax announcement ahead of time.
“I have no way of knowing what my father does or doesn’t do with his personal affairs,” Morneau said.
“What I can tell you is that my father, he’s pretty good at reading. So he would have read the newspapers like 36 million Canadians, and known that we were going to introduce policies that would raise his taxes.”
Yet Morneau was unable to give the date when he instructed his financial adviser to sell the shares, and he appeared to acknowledge that he did not clear it with Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson ahead of time.
“As I said, I did that as I came into office, so before working with the ethics commissioner,” he said when asked if Dawson knew about the share sale.
I HAVE A LEVEL OF DISGUST FOR WHAT IS GOING ON IN THE OTHER SIDE OF THE HOUSE.