Ex-MP says Liberals ignored fraud complaint
REACHING OUT TO ONTARIO VOTERS
A former Liberal MP says his party did nothing to investigate allegations of membership fraud in the nomination of their chosen candidate in a suburban Toronto riding — a claim the party denies.
Paul Szabo, who spent 17 years as MP for Mississauga South, says he warned top officials with the Liberal Party of Canada and its Ontario wing about his concerns about new members signed up last year by nomination contestant Sven Spengemann.
“They never responded to anything I sent to them,” said Szabo, who worked as official agent for Julie Desjardins, Spengemann’s rival for the nomination in the riding, now called Mississauga-Lakeshore.
“This is really difficult, to say your party’s complicit, but there is absolutely 100 per cent proof that they are.”
Spengemann did not respond to requests for comment, but Liberal party executive director Jeremy Broadhurst calls Szabo’s allegations false and says the party “actively engaged” with him on his concerns about memberships and other issues involving the nomination.
Toronto lawyer Andrew Mitchell, who helps resolve issues in the nomination process for the party, looked into the allegations, and the membership committee also reviewed some disputed memberships and eventually disqualified some.
Commissioner of Canada Elections Yves Côté last week revealed that Spengemann had entered into a compliance agreement and admitted overspending on the nomination race in the riding, which he won in September.
Szabo says Côté’s investigation didn’t go far enough.
“I am really disappointed that the Commissioner not only let Sven off the hook but flipped the facts on their head by describing this as an over-contribution issue rather than deliberately failing to report all nomination expenses,” Szabo said.
Szabo says he discovered numerous cases of members who were signed up using questionable addresses and found indications that some had their memberships purchased for them. He also alleges forgery and identity theft among the problems with memberships.
But when he passed his concerns on to Broadhurst and, later, party president Anna Gainey, nothing happened, Szabo said. He also got former Mississauga mayor Hazel McCallion to call Gainey about the matter, but with no result.
Szabo contends that Spengemann was close to other favoured Liberals in the Toronto area who are close to Leader Justin Trudeau, including candidates Navdeep Bains and Omar Alghabra, both former Liberal MPs, and MP Kirsty Duncan.
Szabo also alleges the party told Desjardins she had to drop Szabo as her official agent or face expulsion from the race. He says he agreed to step down so that Desjardins could continue.
Broadhurst says that Szabo had been contacting members signed up in the riding and challenging them about the legitimacy of their membership, which intimidated some, particularly new Canadians who had joined the party for the first time.
“Some of them thought they were in trouble with the government,” Broadhurst said. He also says Szabo circulated a letter to about 600 people in the riding challenging their memberships.
Although Desjardins had been previously approved to seek the nomination, the Szabo letter made her candidacy an “open issue,” so she “disassociated her campaign from him,” Broadhurst said.
After Spengemann won the nomination by 19 votes, Szabo says he took his concerns to Peel Regional Police in October and claims the criminal investigations unit is still looking into his allegations.
He says Peel police encouraged him to forward his complaints to Côté, whose investigation of Szabo’s complaints about spending culminated in the compliance agreement, published on Friday.
The sanction contrasts with that of Tory MP Dean Del Mastro, who earlier this year was convicted of overspending on his 2008 election campaign. Del Mastro was sentenced to one month in jail but is appealing the conviction and sentence.
It is unclear if Del Mastro, who has consistently denied the overspending charge, was offered an opportunity to enter into a compliance agreement.
The Liberals are standing by Spengemann, saying he co-operated fully with Côté’s investigation and entered willingly into the compliance agreement.
Szabo was first elected as MP in 1993 and served as chair of the House of Commons ethics committee. He lost in the 2011 to Conservative Stella Ambler.
Spengemann, a law professor and charity board member, is running against Ambler and New Democrat Eric Guerbilsky.
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