Tuesday 27 August 2019

SNC-Lavalin and Jody Wilson-Raybould: What English Canadian Media Missed

English Canada is once more outraged with the August 14, 2019 report of the Ethics Commissioner on the SNC-Lavalin/Jody Wilson-Raybould (JWR) saga which concluded that the Trudeau administration had crossed the line by exercising undue pressure on JWR.  Mainstream and social media in English Canada have gone viral, for the second time, on a narrative concerning government corruption and seeking to have SNC-Lavalin severely punished, unworthy of a remedial agreement.

In contrast, the narrative in Quebec’s francophone media includes what has been covered in the English Canadian media but comprises the other halves of the repeated plethora English Canada half-truths.  These other halves were rarely mentioned in English Canada.

The other halves context is SNC-Lavalin WAS one of the possibly three Canadian-owned companies with 40,000 employees, 31,000 of which were foreign employees, backed up by a unique Canadian expertise, hence capable of bidding on major international projects.  Contrary to the constant theme in English Canada that the collapse of SNC-Lavalin would have no impact because Canadian demand for engineering/construction services would remain constant, a SNC-Lavalin downfall would represent the loss of a rare Canadian company with an impressive foreign contingent.  The outcome of the dragging out of the saga without any “decision” in view and the English Canada outrage persistently re-fueled, is the company is now a skeleton of what it was.  One can be sure if SNC-Lavalin goes down the tube, its foreign contingent would be butchered by foreign interests, which I suspect has already begun.

From the outset, the question raised in the francophone media is as follows.  Should one let the company go belly-up when 99.99% of its employees having been doing honest days’ work, simply because of a minuscule number of corrupt execs at the top, who are long gone, had been engaged in reprehensible activities?  Should the suppliers lose a major client and pensioner shareholders loose heavily?  When one places the economy in competition with justice, both are losers.  There is no justice when there are thousands of innocent victims.

English Canada has repeatedly called for criminal prosecution.  But going to the courts are like playing a lottery as exemplified by the former CEO, Pierre Duhaime, having been sentenced for a house arrest for reprehensible behavior.

Remedial agreements are not, as falsely implied in English Canada, an escape hatch.  According to an OECD report, 91% of corporate corruption cases are resolved outside of the court system.  Siemens had remedial agreements with the U.S. and European Union in 2018 that entailed a penalty of $1.6B (USD). The Odebrecht et Brasken remedial agreement entailed a $3.5B (USD) fine in 2016. 

Equally important, remedial agreements are negotiated, typically necessitating an overhaul of management and judicial oversight while not excluding options for prosecution of individuals before the courts and fines for individuals.  They punish the company concerned without collateral damage.  That is why the  U.K., the U.S., France, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Israel, Austria, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Bulgaria, Hungary, Luxemburg, Japan, South Korea and Germany have remedial agreement legislation.  These legislative frameworks recognize that the employees should not be innocent victims and the firm’s importance to the national economy should not be comprised by throwing out the baby with the bathwater because of the misdoings of a small number of corrupt officials.

Yet in this saga, English Canada has raised Jody Wilson-Raybould to sainthood.  Never mind that she made her decision in 6 days, between Sept. 4 and 11, 2018, on a very complex question.  Yet faced with another complex issue, Justin Trudeau still hasn’t made up his mind on the selling of armored vehicles to the totalitarian, murderous, warmongering misogynist Saudi Arabia even though 500 of these vehicles have already been delivered. 

JWR did not take into account the report of her Deputy Minister (DM), Nathalie Drouin, on the legal implications of criminal procedures, that is, the advice of The Ministry of Justice, represented by the DM.  On Sept. 19,, 2018, JWR instructed Nathalie Drouin not to raise the SNC-Lavalin matter again despite the fact that the request for the Ministry of Justice report came from the Privy Council.  JWR chose not to transmit the report to the Privy Council.

Much of the outrage of English Canada stems from assuming the Attorney General (AG) has a divine right to be free of interference from other government representatives.  This is another half truth since a Minister of Justice/AG can be hired, fired or transferred by the Prime Minister at any time.  Moreover, as a member of Cabinet, there are the unwritten rules of being a team player. 

A report by the former AG, Anne McLellan, underlined that as a member of Cabinet, the AG cannot operate in a glass jar. Separating the Minister of Justice and AG roles would change nothing in this regard.  

As for JWR complaints of undue pressure, Monique Jérôme-Forget, former Quebec Minister of Finance and President of the Treasury Board, wrapped-up the JWR “performance” as not having the ability to deal with normal ministerial pressures.

Add to the performance issue that her abilities are questioned, JWR having made her mark with a high turnover of staff, administrative delays, mismanagement of the Jordan trial delay file, slowness in the naming of judges, rigidity, and an overzealous focus on Aboriginal issues at the expense of other dossiers.

There are matters of an over-inflated ego, as well.  On April 3, 2019, Hélène Buzzetti in Le Devoir confirmed that JWR had proposed better collaboration on her part in February 2019 in return for a list of 5 demands.  These demands comprise an apology from Justin Trudeau; the firing of PM advisers Gerald Butts and Mathieu Bouchard along with the Clerk of the Privy Council, Michael Wernick; and finally, the adherence of the new Minister of Justice, David Lametti, to maintaining a refusal of a remedial agreement for SNC-Lavalin.  What JWR offered in exchange is not clear.

Louise Beaudoin, former PQ Minister, on April 4, 2019, in a panel discussion on the Radio-Canada television program 24/60 described JWR as more focused on vengeance, than principles. François Cardinal, Editor-in-Chief of La Presse, in the same panel discussion drew the same conclusion, favouring vengeance over justice, but concluded the English media coverage would be played out that JWR acted correctly, and Trudeau was wrong.

In a François Cardinal La Presse editorial of the same day, he alluded to a JWR determination to escalate the saga to Canada’s version of Watergate. 


Lysiane Gagnon (La Presse+), François Cardinal and Louise Beaudoin all concur that Justin Trudeau showed weakness in not booting her out from the very start of her “rebellion.”

So, what is behind the English Canada narrative?  Summarized in Le Devoir, February 12, 2019, by Jean-Robert Sansfaçon, the answer is hypocrisy, and in more colloquial terms, “Quebec-bashing”.  Not only has the aforementioned Saudi Arabia armored vehicle deal not been the subject of a national tirade.  But also not much fuss has been made about saving the Ontario firm Aecon from a Chinese takeover; coming to the rescue of the Ontario auto industry suffering from the self-inflicted wounds of US-based automakers; and inserting the Investment State Dispute Settlement clauses in Canadian free trade agreements to give a license to Bay Street mining companies to sue foreign governments over their respective environmental and resource management regulations.  Yes, each case is different, but the outrage over SNC-Lavalin appears to be motivated by the fact that, unlike the preceding examples, it involves a firm based in Quebec.

Yves Boisvert of La Presse, in an article which appeared March 9, 2019, referred to English Canada’s analyses of the SNC-Lavalin affair as that of narrow-minded, naval-gazing, inward-looking parochialism which builds the “scandal” by sourcing its commentaries within its own media community.


As for the foreign commentaries, they acquire their information from the Toronto media. 

As a federalist resident in Quebec, I am disheartened that this saga has proven that one of the arguments of the independentiste movement have been proven right.  The facts outlined in this article and the devastating implications of a SNC-Lavalin downfall have been largely ignored by English Canada.  This doesn’t mean I am too tender with Quebec as is evident by my National Observer ruthless article on the xenophobia and “Montrealphobia” of the Coalition Avenir Québec.