CANOE -- CNEWS - Canada: Chretien aide admits to hiding deal

CANOE -- CNEWS - Canada: Chretien aide admits to hiding deal: "Chretien aide admits to hiding deal

By JIM BROWN

And they say it is all about integrity . Hmmm -hiding information that is okay along as you are a protected member of the government . Same old -same old -different rules for different folks! When will the unfairness end



Former public works minister Alfonso Gagliano testifies at the sponsorship inquiry in Ottawa. (CP PHOTO/Tobin Grimshaw)
OTTAWA (CP) - The Gomery inquiry was rocked Friday by a startling admission from a onetime top Jean Chretien aide that after leaving the prime minister's office he created a phoney paper trail to hide details of a $125,000 sponsorship deal.
The blunt revelation from Jean Carle - who is described as having a father-son relationship with the former prime minister and once lived in his basement - places the scandal in the heart of Chretien's circle of intimates.
Carle drew a tart observation from Justice John Gomery when he described the transactions, which happened he was a senior executive at the federal Business Development Bank of Canada.
'If this were a drug deal, it would be called money-laundering,' said Gomery.
'You're not wrong,' Carle meekly replied.
His lawyer, Pierre Latraverse, had a different assessment as he later left the hearing room. He called it an 'inappropriate use of words by the judge.'
Carle, who had been director of operations for Chretien from 1993 to 1998, moved to the BDC as a senior vice-president when he left the Prime Minister's Office.

It was at the bank that he got involved in the contentious deal that revolved around funding for a TV series, called Le Canada Millennaire, by producer Robert Scully.
The bank had already given $250,000 of its own to support the series. But the bank then agreed to act as a conduit in transferring an extra $125,000 to Scully's production company, Information Essentielle.
The additional money originated with the Public Works Department"