Jump to content

Gomery report on Sponsorship Program released

Add links
Unchecked
From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!

Wednesday, November 2, 2005

Justice John Gomery has released a preliminary report into Canada's Sponsorship Program, which was run from 1996 to 2003 by the federal Public Works Department to win support for federalism in Quebec. The program has recently come under fire for allegedly scandalous practices and has been accused of being a front to reward Liberal Party supporters.

The issue came to a head in the spring of 2002, when the Globe and Mail, using Canada's Access to Information Act, discovered that $550,000 had been paid to Groupaction Marketing for a report that could not be located.

Former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien then ordered Auditor General Sheila Fraser to look into the matter, who promptly launched a full investigation with assistance from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. In 2004, Fraser's audit was released and found that over $100 million was incorrectly paid to communications agencies rather than for social and cultural events which was the original intention of the program.

According to Fraser, officials "broke just about every rule in the book."

Under intense criticism from both the public and opposition parties Prime Minister Paul Martin launched a public inquiry into the scandal which was to be headed by Justice Gomery.

The report found evidence of political involvement in the handling of the program, and found an "implicit link between the contributions and the expectation that the government contracts would be awarded."

The report also claims that Chrétien holds some personal responsibility for the mismanagement. "Since Mr. Chretien chose to run the program from his own office," the report reasoned "he is accountable for the defective manner in which the sponsorship program and initiatives were implemented."

Among those accused of wrongdoing are Jean Pelletier (Chrétien's former chief of staff), Chuck Guité (the bureaucrat in charge the program), Jacques Corriveau (president of PluriDesign Canada), and Jean Brault (president of Groupaction).

Sources

[edit]
[edit]

Share this:  E-mail this story Share on Facebook Share on reddit.com Share on LinkedIn.com Share on twitter.com


This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.
Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License
Retrieved from "https://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Gomery_report_on_Sponsorship_Program_released"