For whatever reason, the prime minister and his office seem to have a recurring problem of failing to check themselves. As a result, they have now repeatedly wrecked themselves.
Justin Trudeau and his government have shown a remarkable ability to find trouble in novel places — a Christmas vacation, the Shawcross doctrine and the possibility of a deferred prosecution agreement for SNC-Lavalin, the prime minister’s choice of attire during a trip to India.
And now, a national program for student volunteers.
News that a subsidiary of the WE Charity paid Trudeau’s mother and brother for speaking engagements raises further questions about the government’s decision to enlist WE to disburse the funds from that program — and the prime minister’s apparent involvement in signing off on that decision.
It inflames doubts that were already being raised about the intent behind the government’s decision to partner with WE.
But it also makes one wonder why the prime minister keeps putting himself in these situations.
WE insisted at first that “the charity” had “never paid an honorarium” to Margaret Trudeau, the former wife of Pierre Trudeau, who is known for her advocacy on the issue of mental health. In some cases, that statement now appears to be incorrect: the charity did pay Margaret Trudeau for some appearances, though WE now claims that was a paperwork error. But WE’s original claim also elided over the fact that its for-profit arm, ME to WE, had paid the prime minister’s mother.
For WE, it’s impossible to justify that omission. For Trudeau, the newest facts make it much more difficult for him to explain why he went anywhere near this decision.
Trudeau insists that the recommendation to partner with WE came from public service officials and an associate deputy minister has defended the choice. A committee of the House of Commons has requested the internal documentation related to the government’s decision and the paper trail will now be studied closely.
But even a recommendation from a non-partisan public servant won’t be enough to entirely redeem what has happened here.
Even without the participation of Trudeau and his family members in WE events, it’s now obvious that the charity’s involvement would have attracted WE’s various critics regardless. In fact, it was criticism of WE’s general practices and new complaints about how it was administering the volunteer program that compelled the government and the charity to walk away from their arrangement last week.
A scandal in plain sight
That false start has real implications for a program that is supposed to be creating opportunities for young people.
But the demise of the partnership was not enough to end the controversy because of the known ties betwe