Leaked info was well known already: lobbyist
Shipyard details had gotten out, says source
Details of a 2015 cabinet meeting the RCMP suspect Vice Admiral Mark Norman leaked to a company were already known by a number of well-connected individuals in Ottawa, says a retired defence industry lobbyist.
Norman was suspended from his job as second-incommand of the Canadian military more than a year ago after the RCMP alleged he tipped off Davie shipyards that the Liberal government was going to derail a project that involved the Quebec firm converting a commercial ship into a supply vessel.
But Norbert Cyr, a retired military officer who had been a lobbyist for a defence firm as well as working for the defence industry’s top association, says he and a number of others with no connections to Norman or Davie knew the details of the cabinet meeting shortly after it happened.
“Within hours of the cabinet meeting we all knew about it,” said Cyr, who is no longer involved in the defence industry. “Ottawa is a village and something like that gets around so fast. There are note-takers, there are officials, there are people who work on the agenda.”
Cyr, a former lieutenant colonel, has held a number of positions in the defence world. He was a senior military public affairs officer in the Canadian Forces who went on to become a lobbyist for Oerlikon Aerospace and a spokesman for the Canadian Defence Industries Association. Cyr later returned to the Canadian Forces and served as a spokesman for then chief of the defence staff Gen. Walter Natynczyk and later went to work at the Canadian embassy in Washington.
At the time he was provided with information about the outcome of the cabinet meeting he was retired from the Canadian Forces and no longer active in the defence industry.
But Cyr’s information, along with the RCMP’s acknowledgment in legal documents that it has identified another public servant who was allegedly involved in leaking details from the meeting, could prove damaging to the police force’s case against Norman.
Documents filed by the RCMP to obtain a warrant to search Norman’s Ottawa home also indicated a third individual, as yet unidentified, was providing inside information to Davie officials.
In examining the public release of documents related to the Norman case, Ontario Superior Court Justice Kevin Phillips earlier this year raised questions about the RCMP investigation. He noted that for a case to stand against Norman, prosecutors will have to be prove the naval officer was the first in leaky Ottawa to have shared any cabinet confidences or other sensitive information.
Cyr said details that the Liberals were considering delaying Davie’s naval supply ship had also been leaked to Ottawa-based defence industry representatives the day before the cabinet meeting was held on Nov. 19, 2015.
On that day documents show that Privy Council Office officials had a teleconference with Department of National Defence procurement staff, asking them who, other than Davie, might be able to provide the navy with an interim supply ship.
Details of that meeting were widely shared. “There was buzz about it because the questions being asked by PCO — can it be delayed — resonated everywhere,” Cyr explained.
He didn’t identify his sources.
Cyr was also offered by his sources copies of the letters Irving and Seaspan shipyards sent to cabinet ministers complaining about the Davie project. He declined because he was no longer in the defence business and had no need for them.
Cyr said he found it strange that the RCMP have focused on Norman. He decided to approach Postmedia after it published an article raising questions about the Norman case Saturday.
Cabinet ministers decided Nov. 19, 2015 to delay the Davie ship project but the details leaked out and the resulting embarrassment forced the Liberal government to back down on its plans.
The Liberals were furious about the leak and called in the RCMP, who eventually focused on Norman.
Norman wasn’t at the cabinet meeting. He was in Halifax at a security conference.
Norman was suspended from his job by Chief of the Defence Staff Gen. Jon Vance more than a year ago. The vice admiral has denied any wrongdoing and no charges have been laid against him.