MIKE SMYTH: Gordon Wilson’s legal fight with John Horgan gets nastier
Ishudder to think how much taxpayers’ money is being spent to defend Premier John Horgan and cabinet minister Bruce Ralston in their legal battle against Gordon Wilson, the former Liberal leader.
It’s got to be a fortune, especially since this ugly libel case goes all the way back to last summer, when Horgan’s NDP government fired Wilson as the province’s $150,000-a-year “LNG advocate.”
Horgan and Ralston insist he did little to earn his money.
“No briefings, no reports, no memorandums,” is how Horgan summed up Wilson’s three-and-a-half years on the job.
Ralston, the jobs minister, said the government conducted a “review” of Wilson’s work and concluded he did little “other than to cash his cheques.”
Just one problem: A simple search of the government’s own website showed 180 pages of reports, memos and progress updates filed by Wilson to the former Liberal government during his first 15 months on the job alone. (Ironically, the reports were posted after the NDP requested them under freedom-of-information laws.
How the NDP government’s “review” then failed to find them is still a mystery.)
Horgan and Ralston both apologized to Wilson, but Wilson launched a massive suit.
Now for an update on the saga. And you better hang on to your wallets, because this lawsuit could burn B.C. taxpayers to a crisp.
Horgan and Ralston both filed “indemnity applications” to have taxpayers pay their legal fees, and then hired top-flight defence lawyers.
In November, both sides met in a mediation session, presumably to explore terms for an out-of-court settlement.
The contents of the mediation are protected under a non-disclosure agreement, but it’s clear the talks did not go well, as Wilson has now expanded his lawsuit.
On Friday, Wilson filed a new application with the B.C. Supreme Court, seeking to add a long list of media organizations as defendants in the case: The Vancouver Sun, the CBC, CKNW, The Globe and Mail and The Victoria Times Colonist.
Judi Tyabji, Wilson’s wife and also a former Liberal MLA, told me Wilson is hoping the government will simply settle the case.
“It appears the government wants this to go to trial,” she said.
“If that happens, it’s going to rival Basi-Virk in terms of the cost to B.C. taxpayers.”
She’s referring to the notorious B.C. Rail corruption case, in which two government insiders pleaded guilty to charges in return for the government paying their astronomical legal bill: $6 million.
It’s hard to imagine taxpayers getting burned that badly again. But I can easily picture a situation where the public pays through the nose because Horgan and Ralston decided to speak out against a political enemy as they sacked him.
I tried to ask Ralston about the case on Monday.
He refused to comment. The government also refused to tell me how much money this has cost taxpayers so far.
But it’s your money. You deserve to know. It’s up to the premier to tell you.