A slap on the wrist

Well, it wasn’t the SNC-Lavalin would-be deal that saw federal cabinet ministers lose their jobs last winter.

But it was a deal just the same.

Trading in the company’s stock was halted shortly before SNC-Lavalin was supposed to appear at a pre-trial hearing in Montreal on Wednesday for fraud, bribery and corruption charges over the way it landed contracts in Libya.

At the hearing, a division of the company pleaded guilty to one fraud charge while the other corruption charges were dropped, with the prosecution and the company agreeing the firm should pay a $280-million fine over the next five years. The company would also be on probation for three years.

But the plea deal also appears to do what the company was seeking to do a year ago, when pressure was brought to bear on then justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to allow the company to settle its charges with what’s known as a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA).

A DPA would mean that the company would not be found guilty of the charges it faced and could instead pay a fine and commit to cleaning up its behaviour in the future.

At issue were federal government integrity rules that prevent companies convicted of corruption charges from being eligible to bid on federal contracts for 10 years. The company argued that the 10-year ban could cripple the firm and made its case to senior Liberals who, according to Wilson-Raybould, then applied unreasonable pressure on her to allow SNC to have its way.

After its subsidiary filed its guilty plea Wednesday, SNC-Lavalin told shareholders that it did not expect there would be any “long-term material adverse impact on the company’s overall business” due to the conviction.

The deal still has to be approved by the courts, but since it was a joint recommendation from both the prosecution and the defence, it is likely to stand.

That doesn’t mean it shouldn’t leave a bad taste in everyone’s mouths.

Because, just as before, this plea certainly makes it look as if companies get to buy their way out of punishment for their bad deeds.

And this time, it’s all happening right there in front of us, instead of in the backrooms of the Liberal government.