About a month ago it was reported that Peter Tinsley, the chair of the Military Police Complaints Commission, had decided to have public hearings concerning the handling of Afghan detainees by Canadian troops. He made that decision because he felt the DND had stonewalled his investigation and holding public hearings would give him subpoena power.
On Friday — and I'm guessing the timing wasn't accidental — lawyers representing the federal government "quietly" filed an application in Federal Court to halt the Commission's investigation claiming that this issue falls outside of the commission's jurisdiction. Did it take the DND this long to realize that?
A spokesman for Defence Minister Peter MacKay said the government has already provided reams of documents and information -1,300 pages in all - and has delivered 38 witnesses to the commission.
That's awfully strange behaviour when the entire matter is outside the commission's jurisdiction, don't you think?
I seem to recall hearing some platitudes recently about accountability and transparency. It's a pity no one bothered to get any guarantees of same before giving the Prime Minister what he wanted because he seems to be picking up right where he left off: doing everything possible to keep us in the dark.
Ah, a Friday night surprise. They are learning from the Bushies, yes?
IANAL, but it's my impression from Justice O'Connor's experience with the redactions to his report that the Federal Court is relatively deferential to the government, although if you appeal beyond them (Fed Appeals Court and then the Supremes), things get better.
Harper really does not like the arms'-length bodies -- he really does not. Give him a majority and he'll take every one of them apart.
Notice in that story the reason for setting the commish up in the first place -- Somalia.
Learning from the Bushies?
That trick was old when I first started paying any attention to politics. Still works, although this isn't the best kind of thing for it because things don't happen instantly in Federal courts.
Friday night surprises are best for announcements of faits accompli, where nothing else follows immediately from the action--it just disappears quietly until the actual effects of the muted announcement begin screwing the citizens. That way, even though every journo with a spark of wits may notice the ploy the news cycle still makes it hard for them to do a story.
With this, they have to try to get the court to rule in their favour, and it's unlikely they can get all the action to happen on Friday nights. All it does is alert people that something cynical is going on.
It is frankly a testament to the ludicrous incompetence of the latter-day Liberals that these Conservatives managed to take them. This is not smooth operating, this is the paint-by-numbers version of political skulduggery. It's rather embarrassing that in these conditions the NDP can't make any headway.
Strip Harper to the waist and have him whipped in a public square in Kabul. It could be done whilst he's visiting the troops.