WE lobbied government extensively
Documents show charitable group had numerous contacts with ministers and federal departments
OTTAWA — The WE organization lobbied no less than six different ministers’ offices and federal departments a total of 43 times in the six months leading up to the end of the deal with the government to administer the Canada Student Service Grant.
The information, suddenly disclosed by WE Charity in the federal Commissioner of Lobbying’s public registry on Thursday, shows the previously unknown extent to which the Toronto-based organization lobbied the federal government leading up to the signing of a $543.5 million contribution agreement.
“It’s an incredible coincidence that your organization has suddenly registered to lobby, all of these months after all the lobbying happened,” Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre said to WE Charity executives testifying during a Finance committee meeting Thursday.
The new data shows that WE spoke to government officials, political staffers and even three ministers on a variety of topics a total of 21 times between January 29 and May 5, 2020, the date at which the Canada Student Service Grant (CSSG) deal came into effect.
The CSSG was originally outsourced to WE in June, who pulled out of the deal one week later amidst growing controversy about the prime minister’s close ties to the organization.
Part of the new information dumped on the commissioner’s website is a Feb. 7 discussion between WE and the Minister of International Development Karina Gould on the topic of “international development,” records show.
Then, two months later on April 7, WE employees communicated with Minister of Small Business Mary Ng on the topic of “education.” That is the same day WE said they sent government an unsolicited proposal for a social entrepreneurship program that was never put in place.
Lobbying records also show the extent to which WE communicated with Rachel Wernick, senior assistant deputy Minister at Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC), who oversaw the Canada Student Service Grant. Lobbying records show 21 communications by WE between April 24 and July 5.
But those numbers may be higher. Meetings in which the government reached out to WE are seemingly not reported, considering that there are no traces of an April 19 call between Wernick and WE co-founders Craig and Marc Kielburger that she disclosed to the Finance committee in mid-July. WE also had at least eight communications with Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s senior policy adviser, Amitpal Singh.
Both Morneau and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are currently under investigation by the ethics commissioner for having failed to recuse themselves from the government’s decision to outsource the CSSG to WE. Up until now, WE has argued that it did not feel that it met the requirements that would make it necessary to register as a lobbying organization.
“We support and adhere to all accountability rules, including lobbyist registration requirements. However, not all communications with public officials constitute lobbying or need to be registered,” an unnamed WE spokesperson wrote in a July 17 statement.
WE Charity executive director Dalal Al-Waheidi suddenly announced the new lobbying registration while testifying in front of Finance committee on Thursday.
She said it was done despite considering they did not meet the legal requirements that would oblige WE to register.
“For the past few years, our engagement with the government was about one to three per cent of our overall budget. We thought engagement at the time was minimal. And if I thought that registration was required, we would have done it and it would have occurred,” Al-Waheidi said.
Earlier in the day, she announced that WE would be laying off dozens of employees in Canada and the United Kingdom, and selling off some of its Toronto real estate.
During her testimony, Al-Waheidi said the fallout from the “firestorm” surrounding the organization and its deal with the Trudeau government, combined with the COVID-19 pandemic, had been “devastating.”