Jody Wilson-Raybould recorded a conversation with Michael Wernick, the former clerk of the Privy council, and it was leaked to the media. Now, the Prime Minister's Office has admitted that they were unaware of the contents of the conversation.
00:01:14.460Michael Wernick, however, the former clerk of the Privy Council, did not know that his conversation with Jody Wilson-Raybould was being recorded not too long ago.
00:01:23.760And I've got to be perfectly candid with you.
00:01:30.140The fact is, even if the recording was a questionable or ethically questionable thing to do, I think it was the right thing to do because Jody Wilson-Raybould has proven that she is, in fact, a whistleblower.
00:01:42.180And this is a point that's been made by people left and right online, including Emmett McFarlane, a professor from, I believe, Laurier or Waterloo, who I don't normally agree with.
00:01:51.220But he's saying that anyone who's making this about whether Jody Wilson-Raybould should or shouldn't have recorded her phone call with Michael Wernick is missing the mark.
00:01:59.140She was exposing improper or potentially illegal conduct by the Prime Minister's office and by a number of people that are ultimately accountable to the Prime Minister's office.
00:02:11.680Michael Wernick, in this case, seems to be one of those because this guy, who's supposed to be the most senior nonpartisan public servant in Canada, was, as I've talked about in the past, running political interference for the Liberals.
00:02:24.120So that's why this call is so interesting.
00:02:28.060I know it's boring to listen to Michael Wernick talk for even 18 seconds, let alone 18 minutes, but I do think you should listen to this call at some point and listen to the whole thing.
00:02:38.180You can read the transcript, but listen to the whole thing if you can, because what we see in this and hear from this is important for two primary reasons.
00:02:47.040Number one, it proves that everything Jody Wilson-Raybould has said in the past in her testimony towards the Justice Committee is true, that Michael Wernick and the Prime Minister's office were, in fact, putting pressure on her to take a particular decision in the SNC-Lavalin case.
00:03:03.700But it also shows that there's a fight going on.
00:03:08.200One of the things that I've pointed out in the past that I think is a very important point is that Justin Trudeau has changed his tack on this a few times.
00:03:16.620He's changed his tack on this a few times, from the one that everyone now makes fun of, that it was all Scott Bryson's fault, to, you know, we didn't take, we didn't pressure, and we didn't do this, and we didn't do that.
00:03:28.840All of the, I mean, all of the different iterations that the Prime Minister's office's responses have gone through are now at the point where there's no turning away from it.
00:03:38.540Now, complete and utter ignorance is there, because remember, at first they said no one did anything.
00:03:43.500No one did anything to Jody Wilson-Raybould, but now that we have audio of Michael Wernick undoubtedly putting pressure on her, the Prime Minister's office has had to give a statement that is basically pleading ignorance.
00:03:56.400This is what the Prime Minister's office said. We were unaware of the full contents of this recording before today. Unaware.
00:04:07.700Well, she told them. So that means that the Prime Minister's office didn't actually believe Jody Wilson-Raybould when she testified to these things.
00:04:16.480And you may remember when Michael Wernick was testifying, I mean, it sounds like, seems like forever ago now, but when Michael Wernick was testifying, he made that joke,
00:04:23.160oh, you know, I don't know what I said exactly. I wasn't wearing a wire. Well, we know Jody Wilson-Raybould had what can best be described as a wire for that conversation.
00:04:33.520I'm not going to read the whole transcript for you, but I am going to pull out a couple of key excerpts here that I think speak to the fact that we are not dealing with a situation where there is a defensibility to what Wernick said.
00:04:48.460And when I pull this, the source of this particular transcript is from Global News.
00:04:54.420It starts with, you know, some talk about phone tag, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It gets in.
00:04:58.840And then Wernick talks about the jobs element of it, the fact that 9,000 jobs could be lost if SNC-Lavalin decides to uproot from Canada and go somewhere else.
00:05:09.700He says, we want you to know that the deferred prosecution agreement tool is there.
00:05:15.260The Prime Minister wants it. We can get some advice for you from Beverly McLaughlin.
00:05:19.120But this is the line here. The Prime Minister wants to be able to say that he has tried everything he can within legitimate toolbox to try to head that off.
00:05:28.620He is quite determined, quite firm, wants to know why the DPA route, which Parliament provided for, is not being used.
00:05:37.520And I think he is going to find a way to get it done one way or another.
00:05:41.540So he is in that kind of mood. And I wanted you to be aware of that.
00:05:46.420And then he says, I don't know if he's going to call you, but, you know, maybe we're going to do it.
00:05:51.340But he says, the Prime Minister is in a mood where he's going to get it done one way or another.
00:05:58.320That is not, this is your decision. We want you to have a few thoughts about it.
00:06:03.860Talk to some people. Think about it. Consider it.
00:06:06.160That is pressure. That is political pressure. That is political interference.
00:06:10.460So this idea that we just wanted her to consider a second perspective does not square with, he's going to get it done one way or another.
00:06:21.280And this is the conversation. Now, Michael Wernick has now become the fall guy for this.
00:06:25.820He resigned. But even in resignation, there wasn't an admission of wrongdoing.
00:06:30.180You may remember when Michael Wernick stepped down, he said that it was just because he didn't like that he was being bullied and he didn't like the way the opposition parties were talking about him.
00:06:39.140And he didn't think anyone could ever trust him, not because of his conduct and actions, but they couldn't trust him because Andrew Scheer and Jagmeet Singh were saying mean things about him, basically.
00:06:50.320He said they've politicized the role of clerk of the Privy Council, when in actuality, this transcript proves that Michael Wernick politicized the role all on his own.
00:07:02.340It was Wernick who politicized this role.
00:07:05.200And ultimately, Canada still hasn't fully come to terms with that yet because we only had the definitive ironclad proof of it when this phone call was published about, I don't know, 18, 20 hours ago.
00:07:17.080Now, Trudeau has been basically tight-lipped on this.
00:07:21.480I haven't reached out to his office because they never respond to me, but they've said, you know, we didn't know about it.
00:07:28.800The Privy Council office is not commenting any further.
00:07:31.420The Prime Minister's office, apart from that little statement, is not commenting any further.
00:07:36.780And when he says that, oh, we'll give you some political cover by letting you consult with Beverly McLaughlin, the former Chief Justice, to prove that you're not doing anything inappropriate, Jody Wilson-Raybould says, I am 100% confident that I am doing nothing inappropriate.
00:07:53.760And then he said, no, no, no, no, no, but if you do this.
00:07:57.020So there's even an admission, a tacit admission in this call that we know it would be inappropriate, hence we'll give you some political cover to do so, to make that decision.
00:08:08.000And we'll put it under the auspices of you just having a little chit-chat with the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.
00:08:15.840And she says, prosecutorial independence is important.
00:08:20.140She says, I have said time and time again, it's entirely inappropriate, and it is political appearance.
00:08:25.220She says even Beverly McLaughlin would agree this is political interference.
00:08:29.180She says, I've talked about this at the Cabinet table with the Prime Minister.
00:08:34.100And this is, I think, the very important part, because, you know, the whole point that Justin Trudeau tried to make, and again, one of those many statements was, well, did Jody Wilson-Raybould ever say there was a problem?
00:09:16.240So I am actually uncomfortable having this conversation.
00:09:20.040So she tells him right there, I'm uncomfortable that we're even talking about this, that you're even telling me this.
00:09:27.940And she goes on to talk about all the different circumstances under which this would be wrong, and why she's happy with how she's handling this.
00:09:35.200And this actually reinforces the reasoning that she gave in that committee meeting a few weeks back as well, that the reason she didn't feel the need to resign earlier is because she knew that when Trudeau was on a warpath here, and remember the words from Michael Warnick, he's going to get it done one way or another.
00:09:51.200When she knows that Trudeau was on a warpath, it makes it a lot easier for her to say, if I stay in this position, if I remain Attorney General, I am not going to let political interference happen.
00:10:03.900So she honestly believed that her staying in that position was a safeguard of prosecutorial independence.
00:10:12.340And I think that's a really fascinating dilemma.
00:10:15.220So this woman actually was prepared to stay in a very uncomfortable and a very tense situation because she thought that was the only way that she could stand between Trudeau and his potentially illegal outcome of giving a special favor to SNC-Lavalin by giving this deferred prosecution agreement.
00:10:31.720And Warnick keeps saying, but no, no, no, but you have this tool, you have this tool.
00:10:36.680Yeah, part of having a tool in your toolbox is that you can prove that maybe you don't need to use that tool or maybe you don't want to use that tool.
00:10:44.320You can actually say, I'm not going to use that, it's there, but it's not really just like, oh, a screwdriver, hammer, deferred prosecution.
00:10:51.240No, it's like that big red button on the wall with the glass case over it and the hammer next to the glass case and you've got to smash it to get to it.
00:10:59.040It's that, yes, it's there. That doesn't mean it should be deployed with regularity just whenever it's convenient.
00:11:05.120It's there in worst case scenarios. And even then, it sounds like she didn't even want it to be there.
00:11:10.500It was only about a year ago that Parliament put that into effect or a year before this phone call and this political pressure started here.
00:11:18.720And she talks about all the reasons that the actual independent prosecutor was not going through the DPA, reasons that she was committed to upholding.
00:11:28.520Wernick's pushing back on this because, remember, she would need to take over the prosecution from the director of public prosecutions.
00:11:36.280That's a very key part of this. And there's another talk here.
00:11:39.700She says, I know I have a tool under the Prosecution Act that I can use.
00:11:43.680I do not believe that it is appropriate to use the tool in this case.
00:11:48.320And Wernick responds this about the prime minister.
00:12:25.500So, so there is, to give some defense to the prime minister's office, this whole differing opinion thing.
00:12:32.340I mean, the PMO just decides to claim this is not political interference.
00:12:36.580They decide to just pretend there is no interference component to this.
00:12:41.560But Wilson-Raybould was repeatedly making her objections known.
00:12:46.220And the clerk of the Privy Council, clearly not knowing he was being recorded, is pushing back on, no, we're going to get it done one way or another.
00:12:53.920And the implication in that is that if you don't do this, we will find someone who will.
00:14:07.560And much like in the Lindsay Shepard case, the only reason she's able to offer this proof is because she had the forethought to record something.
00:14:15.640And what's interesting is that people are using that to impeach her, basically.
00:14:20.760I want to read the Toronto Star's angle on this.
00:14:23.600So everyone else is saying, oh, this is going to be the end of Justin Trudeau.
00:14:33.720And they talk about the legal ethics on the publication of this particular recording.
00:14:39.640And, oh, my goodness, lawyers aren't supposed to record calls with clients.
00:14:42.540And, you know, forget about solicitor-client privilege.
00:14:44.860This is something that's more serious.
00:14:47.360One lawyer, the Star reports, is potentially going to file a complaint with the Law Society of Ontario.
00:14:53.220Now, worth noting, Jody Wilson-Raybould isn't even from Ontario.
00:14:57.240The only reason she's a member of the Law Society of Ontario is because she's the Attorney General of Canada.
00:15:02.660So if I recall correctly, she needed to become a registrant in each of the bar societies across the country.
00:15:09.300But, I mean, all of that's secondary to the point here.
00:15:11.340You know, I think she would fully accept the consequences of a slap on the wrist from the Law Society when what she is exposing with that recording is a much more significant piece of the puzzle here.
00:15:25.000Because, yes, there may have been a decision that she had to make in recording that was questionably ethical or even questionably legal.
00:15:33.020But it's like running a stop sign to stop a murder.
00:15:36.920I mean, your lower crime is being committed for the protection of a much bigger issue.
00:15:44.040And that's, I think, the very important point to be acknowledged here.
00:15:47.780And I want to read some more comments on this.
00:15:49.340Sharon writes, I don't know how any diehard liberal can support corruption at the top of this party.
00:15:54.420This cuts to the very heart of our rule of law.
00:16:23.480And I would argue that in this particular context, Michael Wernick was not her client.
00:16:28.340Michael Wernick was not talking as a representative of Her Majesty's Government of Canada.
00:16:33.300Michael Wernick was talking as an agent of Justin Trudeau.
00:16:36.780And I do think that is distinct, maybe not from a legal perspective, but from a moral perspective, I think that's relevant here.
00:16:43.920This was not a client calling up a lawyer for, hey, what do I do, counselor, about this parking ticket?
00:16:49.260This was a significant attempt by the Clerk of the Privy Council, who's supposed to be nonpartisan, to inject a political motivation into Jody Wilson-Raybould's tenure and behavior as Attorney General.
00:17:04.120And first off, I don't see any way that she remains in the Liberal Caucus now.
00:17:10.340Like, I do question her judgment on staying in the Liberal Caucus and running as a Liberal.
00:17:16.120When you believe that your party is as rotten to the core as she must believe the Prime Minister's office is,
00:17:21.400how do you justify running in an election on Team Trudeau?
00:17:24.540Because even though it's her name on the ballot, our party system is one that very much means you're running for the betterment of your party's leader.
00:17:32.680So I don't see any way she stays in the Liberal Caucus.
00:17:35.420Jane Philbot's in a bit of a different situation.
00:17:37.440I wouldn't put it past them to eject her from the party now, but she's proven she's in the power position now because she recorded this call.
00:17:47.320So now instead of just distancing himself from her, Trudeau has got to distance himself from Michael Wernick,
00:17:54.000whose virtues he was extolling just a few weeks ago as like being the great-grandfather of Canadian civil discourse.
00:18:00.380And now Wernick's been exposed and Wernick is gone.
00:18:05.660He resigned, I remind you, because he was trying to pin it on like the opposition party,
00:18:09.580but he's resigned whether he knew why at the time or not.
00:22:33.800And especially if this whole underbusing of Jody Wilson-Raybould continues, there are going to be a lot of high-ranking liberals that become very uncomfortable with what they're about to see.
00:22:43.000And remember, that hasn't even started yet.
00:22:45.220That's going to be in the next week and a bit that we start to see exactly how the government response to this unfolds.
00:22:52.320But their whole no comment thing is not at all going to hold.