Senate wants residency review kept secret, Duffy trial told
Internal audit asked senators for supporting documents
OTTAWA— The Senate says it will fight to keep secret an undisclosed internal Senate review conducted in late 2012 or early 2013 that it wants to withhold from Mike Duffy’s fraud trial.
The Senate, through its communications office, declined to say anything about the review conducted by Jill-Ann Joseph, a director of internal audit and strategic planning. Spokeswoman Nancy Durning told the Star “it is in front of the courts and we cannot be seen as influencing that decision.”
The surprise new legal battle line opened up Monday as week four of testimony began.
It quickly became part of what Duffy’s lawyer Donald Bayne has called the “narrative” that Duffy was singled out for scrutiny once his expenses hit headlines and embarrassed the government.
Bayne was grilling the Senate’s top administrative officer, Nicole Proulx, over why Duffy’s expenses were deemed out-of-line when the rules did not explicitly define “primary” and “secondary” residence, and when those of other senators like Conservative Sen. Carolyn Stewart Olsen — who has long lived in Ottawa despite sitting as a senator from New Brunswick — drew no such scrutiny.
Bayne asked Proulx whether a review of senators’ residences and the documentation required as proof of residency — conducted by Jill-Ann Joseph — had “recommended changes.”
Suddenly, deputy Crown attorney Mark Holmes stood and advised the judge that the Senate had notified defence and prosecution lawyers it will assert “parliamentary privilege” over evidence it didn’t want introduced — even indirectly.
Holmes said the Crown wasn’t attempting to withhold any evidence from disclosure or assert privilege.
But the very existence of the review was a surprise to many observers in the courtroom, which on Monday included a lawyer for Proulx, Joseph and other Senate administration employees, lawyers for the Senate, and, for the first time, one of Nigel Wright’s lawyers.
Nevertheless, the RCMP did refer to the review in an early affidavit in the Duffy case, saying the Senate’s internal economy committee had instructed Senate administration to do an audit and “assess whether all senators’ declarations of primary and secondary residence are supported by sufficient documentation.”
Bayne made clear to Judge Charles Vaillancourt he believes he is being deliberately stymied in his defence.
“You can see I’m going to be confronted, for example, on the internal audit that the Senate doesn’t want now to be publicly disclosed, I’m going to be confronted with an argument of parliamentary privilege.
“So it’s not going to be . . . very easy for me. I don’t have a willing and compliant Senate here giving me access to documents and I can’t issue orders to produce, like the police,” said Bayne.
In fact, Bayne challenged Proulx’s credibility repeatedly, suggesting she was overly “helpful” to police investigators, unco-operative with Duffy’s team and is “defensive” because she fears the senate administration she now runs is on trial.
He suggested Proulx and her staff did not show nearly the same willingness to pursue others for claiming living expenses in Ottawa, such as the prime minister’s longtime press secretary, Stewart Olsen, also appointed to the Senate. Bayne noted she “sat in judgment of Sen. Duffy” on the Senate’s internal economy steering committee. Proulx said she didn’t believe it was “my role” to comment on other senators.
“I’ve always been told that I would not be on trial,” she told Bayne.
“And you’re not ma’am,” Bayne said cooly. “There’s only one person whose liberty is at stake here.” Bayne repeatedly mentioned Proulx’s status as a mere “administrative official” and not a “legal expert.”
Then he asked her to interpret the Constitution Act’s statement of qualifications of a senator. She demurred it was “outside my area of responsibility.”
She agreed with Bayne that Duffy did not “hide” his Ottawa residence, after he submitted a letter to senate officials that he and his wife had lived in Ottawa’s suburb of Kanata for the previous 7 years.
Bayne is to continue his cross-examination.