Duffy spoke with PM about his expenses
Harper insisted inappropriate claims be repaid: spokesman
OTTAWA — Sen. Mike Duffy approached Prime Minister Stephen Harper following a mid-February Conservative caucus meeting to discuss his expense claims, the Prime Minister’s Office says — the only time the two spoke about the senator’s questionable spending.
Duffy caught Harper’s attention after the meeting to talk about his claims, which he believed were in order, but the prime minister insisted any inappropriate expenses be repaid.
“Following a caucus meeting, Mr. Duffy approached the prime minister in the caucus room regarding the situation with his expenses. The prime minister was adamant that he should repay any inappropriate expenses,” Andrew MacDougall, Harper’s director of communications, told Postmedia News Friday.
The chat was the only time the two men spoke about the issue, MacDougall said.
Harper, according to some who were in the room, had just told his caucus at that February meeting that any improper expense claims should be repaid. He did not mention Duffy or any other senator by name.
On Friday, Duffy told reporters in Prince Edward Island it’s inappropriate for him to comment much while his actions and expenses are still being examined, but he believes he’ll be vindicated.
“When that work is done, I think that Canadians will agree, as the independent auditors at Deloitte found, that criticism of my expenses is, frankly, largely without merit,” Duffy said.
The timeline of events over the past few months suggests Duffy was under enormous pressure from his Conservative colleagues to pay back money he felt he had correctly claimed under Senate rules. On Feb. 22, Duffy said he would repay the expenses, but believed he had done nothing wrong.
The Senate was reimbursed March 25 for $90,000 in living expense claims, but the information wasn’t made public until April 19.
Information has been trickling out almost daily since Harper’s office confirmed about two weeks ago the prime minister’s then-chief of staff, Nigel Wright, gave Duffy a $90,000 cheque to cover repayment of his expenses. Leaks of partial email exchanges to the CBC have led opposition MPs and senators to demand, unsuccessfully, that the government release any records it has. The government says there is no documentation and, on Friday, continued to say Wright acted alone.
“We know there is documentation on the Duffy affair because emails are discreetly appearing every day,” Liberal MP Marc Garneau said in the House of Commons.
Reached Friday, Duffy declined to comment.
The Liberals formally asked this week for any existing documentation, sending access to information requests to the Department of Justice and the Privy Council Office, the central bureaucracy that aids the prime minister and cabinet.
The Liberals, who form the Opposition in the Senate, said Friday they would publicly post any documents released to them, a process that could take months. The request asks for all documentation or emails between Duffy and Wright regarding Duffy’s expenses, and on any agreement regarding the $90,000 cheque Duffy wrote.
“Why doesn’t the government save everybody a lot of trouble, and if they have nothing to hide, why don’t they just make everything public?” Garneau told reporters outside the Commons.
At least one Conservative MP — Michelle Rempel — has suggested publicly that Duffy should resign his Senate seat.
Harper appointed Duffy to the Senate in late 2008 and he officially took his seat in January 2009.
Harper’s office wouldn’t say Friday whether Duffy should resign, insisting it’s a matter for the Senate to decide. (The prime minister doesn’t have the power to remove someone from the Senate — but the upper chamber has the power to declare a seat vacated.)
“That’s a question for the Senate to determine. They have a process there,” said MacDougall.