‘That’s the bar? It’s not criminal?’

KEY EXCHANGES FROM WERNICK TESTIMONY

OT TAWA • The House justice committee investigating alleged attempts to interfere politically in the criminal prosecution of Snc-lavalin had a chance to question two key players anew on Wednesday.

Michael Wernick, the clerk of the privy council and the highest-ranking public servant in the Canadian government, testified to the committee two weeks ago that in meetings with Justice Minister Jody Wilson-raybould, no inappropriate pressure was applied — he only provided her with “context.”

But Wilson-raybould’s own testimony last week, bolstered by contemporaneous notes, contradicted Wernick’s. She alleged that he, the prime minister and a host of other officials engaged in a sustained effort to pressure her into offering a remediation agreement to the Montreal engineering firm. Her testimony also unearthed new information about the role deputy minister Nathalie Drouin had played.

Here were some of the most interesting exchanges from Wernick and Drouin’s second round of questioning:

ON ALLEGATIONS OF POLITICAL PRESSURE ON JODY WILSON-RAYBOULD

❚ Rankin: On Dec. 19, 2018, we’ve had a number of comments made by Madam Justice WilsonRaybould about yourself and I want to give you the opportunity to refute them. No. 1: You’re quoted as saying, “I think he is going to find a way,” speaking about the prime minister, “to get it done one way or the other, so he is in that kind of mood and I wanted you to be aware of it.” Did you say that? Or words approximating that?

❚ Wernick: I do not have an independent recollection of the event. I did not wear a wire, record the conversation or take extemporaneous notes.

❚ Rankin: So you wouldn’t have stuck in your mind words like that.

❚ Wernick: That is not my recollection of the conversation.

ON WHAT WAS SAID IN A SEPTEMBER MEETING WITH WILSON-RAYBOULD

❚ Pierre Poilievre (Conservative): Mr. Wernick, on September 17, 2018, in your presence, the prime minister told the attorney general that if there was no deferred prosecution agreement that SNC will move from Montreal. Did the prime minister know at the time that a financing agreement with the caisse de depot made it impossible for SNC to move its headquarters before the year (2024)?

❚ Wernick: That is not my recollection of what the prime minister said.

❚ Poilievre: So he did not say that SNC will move from Montreal if it does not get a deferred prosecution agreement?

❚ Wernick: That’s not my recollection of what he said.

❚ Poilievre: How about let’s turn to what you said? Hopefully your memory is a little better on that. At the same meeting you told the attorney general that there would be a board meeting of Snc-lavalin within three days and they will likely be moving to London. Who told you that SNC would likely announce a move of its headquarters to London at its Sept. 20, 2018 board meeting?

❚ Wernick: That is not my recollection of what I said.

ON WHEN THE PRIME MINISTER AND THE CLERK KNEW THAT WILSON-RAYBOULD HAD MADE A DECISION ABOUT SNC-LAVALIN

❚ Lisa Raitt (Conservative): Would you now say your testimony is you found out from the attorney general, former attorney general, that she had made up her mind on this issue by Sept. 17?

❚ Wernick: I accept that on Sept. 17 in her mind she had made a final decision. In law, the decision is never final because she could always take into consideration public interest considerations and was able to take into account new information.

ON WILSON-RAYBOULD’S TESTIMONY

❚ Charlie Angus (NDP): She said she expected the Saturday night massacre, which was a reference to Richard Milhous Nixon and the firing of the special prosecutor. And lo and behold, she was replaced two weeks later. So I think Minister Wilson-raybould’s testimony was very credible and I’m very sad that you get a second kick at the can and she’s not being given the chance to rebut what you’re saying.

❚ Wernick: Mr. Chair, if I may, quickly, I know that many members of this committee have said they believed every word of the former attorney general’s testimony. Part of what she testified is she does not believe that any behaviour crossed the threshold of criminal behaviour. So, that was her testimony.

❚ An MP shouts: That’s the bar? It’s not criminal?