It isn’t just Rep. Cummings that stirred my heart last week. (1)
It was also the stands that two Canadian Members of Parliament and one provincial civil servant have taken towards maintaining respect for the rule of law.
I have to say I don’t follow Canadian politics any more than I do any other country’s. So please forgive me if get a detail wrong.
In this first video, former Attorney-General Jody Wilson-Raybould testifies before Parliament that her Liberal colleagues and their civil servants, right up to the Prime Minister, interfered with the administration of justice on behalf of a large Montreal-based company called SNC Lavellin.
SNC stands alleged to have bribed Libyan and Canadian officials and the Liberal government was exposed as allegedly having ignored the political independence of the judicial officials involved – the Attorney General and the Director of Public Prosecutions.
The pattern of interference went as far as to fire her from her portfolio to “find a solution” that would let SNC off the legal hook.
In the last five minutes or so, Wilson-Raybould describes how she is a native Canadian leader, one of a matriarchal line, and has seen this kind of disrespect for the rule of law in Canada’s relations with First Nations.
MP Michelle Rempel lays out the significance of the SNC Lavellin matter. Particularly heartwarming is the fact that Wilson-Raybaud and Rempel are in different parties – Liberal and Conservative. Both are speaking truth to power.
And finally I want to append the Plecas Report, the report of the Speaker of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly, reporting a pattern of criminality involving the Clerk of the Assembly and the Sergeant-at-Arms.
His report is a model of probity. I hope all three items are long studied in law schools at Canadian universities.
I administered a section of a Canadian statute (the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act) as a member of a human-rights tribunal. And I came to have such respect and admiration for Canadian law and its interpretation in general and for the dedication of many people to upholding it – not among all, as we see here – but among judges and civil servants.
Time to cleanse the rest of the system.
It warms my heart to see these folks take a stand for that.
The Plecas Report follows.
Footnotes
(1) “Rep. Elijah Cumming: ‘We Are Better than This,’” https://goldenageofgaia.com/2019/03/01/rep-elijah-cumming-we-can-do-better/ I know that many of you consider Rep. Cummings to be caught up in partisan politics as are the media that post his comments. But I focus on the stirring words he uttered.
2019-01-21_Speaker Plecas Report