Complaints of influence on election soar

Investigation office received 105 concerns about foreign financing in 2015 campaign

OTTAWA— Canada’s top elections investigation office has received 105 complaints about the influential role played by third parties in the 2015 federal election campaign.

That’s a much higher number than the12 complaints filed about the previous 2011campaign, and higher than the 35 complaints initially reported to parliament after the last election.

It comes as the federal Liberal government vows to modernize election financing rules governing third-parties, and has instructed Canada’s electronic spy agency, the CSE, to review how vulnerable Canada’s election system is to foreign influence.

The exact nature of the complaints — whether they relate to undue influence by foreigners or unreported spending by third parties in the sixmonth window before, or during, a campaign — is unclear.

The office of Yves Côté, Commissioner of Canada Elections, refused to discuss the complaints received, or whether or not it has opened investigations into them.

Michelle Laliberté, a spokesperson for the chief investigator, said longstanding policy prevents Côté from commenting on complaints received, and he is required by law not to discuss ongoing investigations.

However, news of the soaring number came on a day when two Conservative party members publicized their own formal complaints about improper foreign influence by the left-leaning U.S.-based environmental pressure group, Tides Foundation, in the last campaign.

Alberta MP Michael Cooper, the Conservative deputy justice critic, wrote to Côté’s office to ask him to

“(A money transfer) raises broader concerns about foreign entities . . . trying to influence our democratic politics.” MICHAEL COOPER TORY DEPUTY JUSTICE CRITIC

begin an investigation into almost $700,000 in contributions from Tides to eight Canadian registered third-parties in 2015.

Cooper listed the Council of Canadians, Dogwood Initiative, Ecology Ottawa, Equieterre, Greenpeace Canada, Toronto350, West Coast Environmental Law Association, West Coast Environmental Law Research Foundation — as groups he said received money from the U.S. advocacy group.

Cooper’s complaint is that these groups received thousands of dollars from a U.S. interest group during the same year as an election in which they were active as third-party cam- paigners. It is possible that they used this money on election advertising, which could contravene sections of the Elections Canada Act that prohibit foreign influence on voters as well as the use of foreign-donations on election campaign advertising by third parties, he said in an interview.

Cooper pointed to Côté’s testimony before a Senate committee, in which Côté said his office interprets the law to mean third parties can’t use foreign contributions on election advertising within the six months before the writ is dropped. That means any money from Tides between February 2015 and election day in October would be offside, Cooper said.

“There was a clear, clean transfer of money,” Cooper told the Star on Tuesday. “That raises broader concerns about foreign entities and foreign interests trying to influence our democratic politics.”

In addition to Cooper’s call for investigation, former Conservative MP Joan Crockatt — who lost her seat in Calgary in 2015 — says she submitted a separate complaint to Elections Canada. Her allegation is based on a report from her group Canada Decides, which she said investigated the flow of $1.96 million in foreign money from the Tides Foundation to third party groups in Canada that were active during the 2015 vote.

Crockatt declined to provide the full report to the Star, while Cooper said he plans to table her report in the House of Commons next week. Cooper said he has been in touch with Crockatt on her complaint, but has not read the final report she submitted to Elections Canada.

NOTE: The Toronto Star partnered with Tides Canada in 2015 to produce a series of articles covering climate issues in Canada leading up to the UN Climate Change Conference in Paris in December 2015. The Star had full editorial control over the stories which were written by environment writer Tyler Hamilton.