CHARGES ‘NOT OUR ISSUE’
Liberals backing campaign boss, who’ll go to court after election
The latest email update from B.C. Liberal headquarters was sent out this week with the news that the author had been the beneficiary of a somewhat brazen promotion.
“My first update as 2017 campaign director,” announced Laura Miller, who’d just been appointed the party’s overseer for the next provincial election despite facing criminal charges in connection with her work as a political staffer in Ontario.
Miller helped the B.C. Liberals to their big win in the 2013 election and was afterward appointed executive director, the senior manager for the party’s day-to-day operations between elections.
She resigned the post late last year after being charged in Ontario with breach of trust and two other criminal code offences over the alleged destruction of documents in early 2013 when she served as deputy chief of staff to departing premier Dalton McGuinty.
Miller denied the allegations and declared her intention to plead not guilty. But as Premier Christy Clark explained, she needed the time out from her duties in B.C. “to focus on clearing her name” back East.
Four months later, having organized a defence that included raising tens of thousands of dollars through crowdfunding, Miller was back on the job at B.C. Liberal headquarters. “There was always the notion that once her defence was organized, there was a possibility that we would take her back,” deputy premier Rich Coleman said, confirming the party brass had decided they couldn’t manage without her.
“From my experience, I would say that she is one of the best organizers in the country,” said Coleman, who co-chaired the last campaign for the Liberals and is slated to do the same next year.
“The party is better organized and better financed than it has been in decades.”
He also discounted the possibility that the serious charges hanging over Miller’s head in Ontario might taint the party she serves in B.C.
“It is something that happened in another jurisdiction,” said Coleman, characterizing breach of trust and the rest as so out-of-province and so three years ago. “This is a pretty old case, as you know … which is not really our issue.”
The premier continued to defend her recruit from Ontario as well.
“She hasn’t been convicted of anything and she’s doing a great job at making sure that our party is in the shape that we need it to be to win the next election,” Clark said recently.
“What I would say about her is I know her to be a very, very ethical person.”
Armed with that testimonial from the boss, the party this week elevated Miller to the post of campaign director.
New Democrats have entertained the hope that the courtroom proceedings might further embarrass the Liberals or even force Miller to interrupt her service to return to Ontario before or during the election.
Those possibilities were dashed when the trial of Miller and another former McGuinty staffer was scheduled for September 2017, four months after British Columbians go to the polls.
The Opposition was dealt a similar disappointment last week over the sole criminal charge arising out of the Liberals’ scandalous attempt to score quick wins in the multicultural community before the last election.
After losing the election, the New Democrats rounded up a trove of documents that had belatedly fallen into their hands and delivered them to police, along with allegations of wrongdoing going back to the 2011 B.C. Liberal leadership won by Premier Clark.
There followed a lengthy police investigation, overseen by a special prosecutor. Then last May a company tied to the Liberals pleaded guilty for failing to disclose spending $2,240 to hire an ethnic organizer during a 2012 byelection campaign. With the governing party having lost the byelection, the fine was put at a modest $5,000.
Charged with criminal breach of trust at the same time was Brian Bonney, a longtime Liberal political operative. He was accused in connection with his work in late 2011 and 2012 as a senior staffer for government outreach to the multicultural community.
Bonney is pleading not guilty. And neither the plea by the company nor the charge against him suggested any firm connection to political higher-ups or the leadership race.
New Democrats took some consolation in special prosecutor David Butcher telling the court the Election Act offence was “not an inadvertent error” but part of a “greater scheme.” However, the defence attorney for the company denied any link to a broader pattern of wrongdoing.
Scheme or no scheme, the evidence — including the material assembled by the NDP — won’t be presented in open court until well after the election. The case is set to start on Oct. 16 of next year and closing arguments won’t be heard until February 2018.
“These dates were scheduled following a pre-trial conference with a senior judge and discussions between the special prosecutor and defence counsel,” according to the announcement last week from the criminal justice branch.
“(They) took into account the amount of time required for trial preparation, the length of the trial, and the availability of the court and counsel.”
Thus, the New Democrats will be left to their own devices — attack ads, speeches, press releases and the like — if they wish to make political hay out of these two cases before the election. Look for them to do so, as the Opposition’s own post-mortem on the last campaign faulted the NDP for failing to exploit the B.C. Liberals’ myriad ethical failings and scandals.
It is something that happened in another jurisdiction … this is a pretty old case, as you know.
RICH COLEMAN, deputy premier, on Liberal campaign director Laura Miller’ s criminal charges