Montreal mayor stepped down, eyes drawn on Denis Coderre

[Sleipnir]

http://www.agoracosmopolitan.com/news/canadian_news/2012/11/10/4822.html

Mayor of Montreal step down

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http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/montreal/Denis+Coderre+throw+into+Montreal+mayoralty+ring/7527537/story.html

Denis Coderre sends strong signal that he may run for mayor of Montreal

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This could leave Denis Coderre riding, Bourassa, vacant, in the near future.

If this happens I can see Brian Topp gunning for that seat, same for Daniel Paille for the Bloc. As for the Liberals and Conservatives - no idea.

[GostHacked]

Laval mayor stepped down as well. Also two mob bosses have been found dead since this all started to go down. Huge scandal.

[August1991]

This thread should rightly be in the Local Politics category. Then again, maybe not.

I may be wrong (google search?) but it seems to me that the original impetus for the Charbonneau Commission came from an investigation (pursued after the 2006 election) of bribe-taking in the federal tax agency (CRA) in Montreal.

The CRA is the ultimate federal authority in each province of Canada. The senior bureaucrats of what used to be known as Revenue Canada know alot about what is going on provincially: who earns what, who declares what. Our federal system is a balance of competing sovereign interests, alpha-personalities. Tax authorities and the police are key players in this game.

[There were also RCMP recordings in a Montreal restaurant of the mafia, and inadvertently of construction business people. These recordings came to light later.]

I may be wrong but I see the paw prints of Stephen Harper all over this Charbonneau Commission.

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Coderre as mayor of Montreal? Couillard as PM of Quebec?

Here's the problem with both predictions: neither man may be able to manage the after effects of the atomic bomb that Harper has dropped (I suspect) on Quebec's political landscape. Both Coderre and Couillard may be too radioactive.

Then again, many Quebec voters simply want things as they are. Let's see what kind of protective suit Coderre and Couillard are wearing.

Edited November 14, 2012 by August1991

[Sleipnir]

This thread should rightly be in the Local Politics category. Then again, maybe not.

I was thinking of that. Then I realize that if Coderre were to stepped down to run for mayor, it would have a wider effect on the federal level than the provincial.

[cybercoma]

Coderre as mayor of Montreal? Couillard as PM of Quebec?

You put them both together and what do you get?

Coulier!

[August1991]

Federalists, Liberals, in Quebec wonder. I suspect that Jean Charest and Gerald Tremblay do not.

IMHO: Le Devoir should give credit to Harper, the federal system, for this investigation of Quebec corruption.

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Centralised power is dangerous. A federal system is better.

Edited November 17, 2012 by August1991

[Fletch 27]

The NDP hold the union vote.... Just wait... The liberals just like the money.... The NDP love the control.... Juuuuust wait... Mulcair has been faaaaaaar to silent.

[Fletch 27]

Don't forget mulcairs old role within the liberal party...... That's just a heads up....

[August1991]

Don't forget mulcairs old role within the liberal party...... That's just a heads up....

It's rather remarkable that Mulcair shared the same caucus with both Tremblay and Couillard - and in the case of Couillard, Mulcair sat with him around the same cabinet table.

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The Le Devoir interpretation/view/rumour is that Quebec federalists (ie. Quebec Liberals) are dirty and IMHO, there is some truth to this rumour. Canada is held together through graft. I'm reminded of Trudeau's comment to his son: don't get involved in politics, it's too dirty - or Tremblay's comment to an assistant: payoffs, that's all it is. In this view, Quebec federalists are the Québécois de service. English Canada buys Quebec support. (In the same view, Lévesque's government was clean, and not federalist.)

Then again, Claude Ryan - a federalist - was beyond reproach. But he was never elected and Trudeau never liked him. And Stephen Harper, an English outsider, apparently started this recent investigation into Quebec federalist corruption.

Maybe Harper hates the Liberals more than he wants to keep Canada together.

This RCMP investigation into allegations of corruption within the CRA was initiated in 2008. Several components of the investigation have yet to be completed, and additional arrests and charges could be pending.

RCMP Web Site Edited November 19, 2012 by August1991

[August1991]

In what is ballooning into the largest corporate scandal in Canada’s history, Quebec anti-corruption police have arrested the former chief executive of engineering giant SNC-Lavalin Inc. and begun efforts to extradite another former company executive who is in a Swiss jail.

National Post

It is hard not to see that Stephen Harper has dropped an Atomic Bomb on federal Quebec, with unpredictable consequences.

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Maybe this is like George W. invading Iraq: A politician decides that the status quo is no longer tolerable since, God knows the future, but anything else is better.

Edited November 29, 2012 by August1991

[August1991]

This makes me laugh.

Note the dates of Harper's election, the RCMP/federal CRA investigation above, and the beginning of the Enquête investigation.

Canadian Journalists for Free Expression (CJFE) will present its 2012 Tara Singh Hayer Memorial Award to Enquête, Radio-Canada’s investigative television program, for taking great risks to expose major cases of corruption in Québec. The award will be presented at the 15th Annual CJFE Gala, to be held December 5, 2012, at the Fairmont Royal York hotel in Toronto.

The Tara Singh Hayer Memhave orial Award recognizes a Canadian journalist or organization who has made an important contribution to reinforcing and promoting freedom of the press in this country or elsewhere.

Despite facing legal threats, violence and intimidation, Enquête’s small team of tenacious reporters and researchers, led by host Alain Gravel, bravely continued their investigation of organized crime in Québec. Their work revealed ties between organized crime, the construction industry, the judicial system and politicians, and led in part to the ongoing inquiry of the Charbonneau Commission.

CBC/Radio-Canada

In the spring of 2009, the Radio-Canada program Enquête began a series of hard-hitting documentaries that revealed the disturbing truth of something Quebecers had suspected for many years: organized crime bosses worked hand in glove with both the construction industry and government bureaucrats who awarded highly lucrative contracts. Enquête revealed the details of what became known as the Fabulous 14—a group of construction magnates who colluded to ensure all public works pro- jects in Montreal, or indeed most parts of Quebec, were awarded to their members. The cost to Quebec taxpayers was enormous—they were paying 35 per cent more for construction than taxpayers did in other provinces.

CJFE

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I have nothing bad to say about Enquête or Radio-Canada, or the GRC or the CAQ or the Charbonneau Commission. Without honest people within these organisations, there would be no investigation. I merely want to say that, looking at dates (and maybe I'm wrong), Stephen Harper apparently started this ball rolling.

Edited December 7, 2012 by August1991