Editor’s Note: This is a very old (2005) article which has been through many website upgrades and server transitions, and has lost some of its original formatting and content.
Here’s a repeat of something I posted in the columnist section—it’s a “Handy Guide” to help Canadians (and bedazzled Americans and others in the world) get up-to-speed on the sponsorship scandal the Liberals are currently trying to sweep under the carpet with their emergency gay ‘marriage’ legislation among other things of equal urgency for our nation—you know, like loosening the pot-smoking laws to enable kids to get high on drugs without the hassle of jail or a criminal record, a national socialist daycare program that absolutely nobody asked for so parents can plug their kids into the nanny-state program, etc.
Note that this was written in June of last year [2004]—we now know even more, and an election happened after this post.
Liberal Scandal, Scams, and Arrogance: A Handy Guide
In Canada, the “sponsorship scandal” is being swept under the carpet by the Liberals and the media. And many don’t even know what it’s about. Here’s a guide.
The scandal is about a Liberal government program in which they set up a huge budget that was designed to help national unity in light of a Quebec separation referendum. The idea seemed to be the brilliant “plaster the huge ‘Canada’ logo over every damn thing in the country” idea. The result is that now, everything looks like it was “brought to you by the government”. Oh goody. A socialist dream come true. We also have the Bloc Quebecois seemingly poised to become the major power-broker in Canada’s parliament, taking nearly every single seat in Quebec. Beauty! The plan worked out exactly as most government projects do!
The plan cost us a mere $250,000,000. That’s a quarter of a BILLION dollars. Plus another $500 MILLION (half a BILLION) later discovered after the Auditor General’s scathing report came out earlier this year. But it’s not really the amount of the money, believe it or not, that is at the core of the scandal. It’s a question of where the money ended up—which always tended to have the words “Liberal Party” attached to it.
As handy a guide as this is, we don’t know even a fraction of what has gone on in the “Sponsorship scandal”, or “Adscam”, or whatever you choose to call what I call “the most hellacious political corruption in the history of ‘our Canada’ “.
We merely have a few measly tidbits. Such as what follows. The only people who really know exactly what happened and where all the money went is the Liberals. Like Paul Martin, who was finance minister nearly the whole time. Oh well. Too bad so many people will vote for them anyway, endorsing their corruption, and likely pushing them back into power.
Molson Indy
Over 5 years the Sponsorship Fund doled out $1.2 million to the Toronto Molson Indy. But it wasn’t paid to the race organizers, it went to a Liberal Party-friendly ad agency. And of that money, $346,507 was kept by a Liberal Party ad agency to pay for “commissions and production fees”. The ad agency then forwarded a cheque for the rest to the race organizers. Why? Who knows!
But “commissions and production fees”? The Toronto Molson Indy wasn’t a production of “Canada”! Nearly 29 percent of the taxpayer contribution to the Toronto Molson Indy went to a Liberal ad firm—for what?
Not for anything reusable, apparently… The exact same thing happened at the Vancouver Molson Indy. The Sponsorship Fund laid $1.19 million onto that event and ad agencies kept $364,286 in commissions and handling fees.
Ice Hockey
In 2000-2001, the Sponsorship Fund handed out $905,000 to the NHL. As usual, for some weird reason, the money didn’t go to the NHL, it went to a Liberal-connected ad agency. Group Everest, received a commission of $108,600, and yet another agency, Media/I.D.A. Vision, got a commission of $27,150.
Plus the Liberal government paid out another $95,000 in “sub-contracting production” through this agency. So the total cost of the NHL deal was $1,135,750.
Then there was the official government sponsorship of a television series involving Maurice “Rocket” Richard (I personally never even heard of it, and certainly wouldn’t bother watching it, but then like 94.2 percent of Canada, I also don’t watch the billion-dollar-per-year state-run media giant, the CBC, and that never bothered the Liberals).
A private company, L’information essentialle, produced this series and got $4.75 MILLION Sponsorship Fund grant to do it. Out of that money FIVE ad agencies (Lafleur, Media/I.D.A. Vision, Gosselin, and Groupaction) received $437,532 in commissions without signing ANY CONTRACTS or even DOING ANY WORK.
Go for a pee—there’s lots more! The Liberal government also got government-owned Via Rail to advance nearly $1 MILLION to this TV series. Why would government-owned VIA Rail advance additional money to this project? Who knows! (Well, the Liberal Party no doubt knows, but not us lowly Canadians).
Canada’s Auditor General Sheila Fraser voiced her suspicion about this whole thing, but the Liberals didn’t care what she said:
“It appears that these transactions were part of an elaborate process used to obtain funds from current appropriations, in order to pay for a highly irregular and questionable expenditure incurred by VIA Rail…and also to facilitate the payment of a commission to the communications agency.”
Canada Post ALSO paid $1.6 million to sponsor the series, WITHOUT ANY DOCUMENTATION.
Another government-owned outfit feeding cash to this series? Why? Who knows! Oh yeah, the Liberals know.
RCMP
Yes, the Liberal government even got its RCMP involved. Of course the RCMP is currently investigating this whole sponsorship scandal. Interesting!
The Liberals decided to sponsor the RCMP’s 125th anniversary, through the Sponsorship Fund program, which laid out $3 MILLION. I never even knew the RCMP had a big celebration and if I had a vote on spending that cash I’d have laughed as I voted “not a chance in hell”, especially given the massive underfunding of the RCMP in this era of global terrorism.
But they didn’t give the money directly to them, as eerily usual. No, the Liberals funneled the money, for no apparent reason, to three ad agencies—Lafleur, Media/I.D.A. Vision, and Gosselin. They then sent the money to the RCMP.
Ad agencies doling out government money to a government agency? Why?! Who knows? The Liberals know!
Before passing the money on to the RCMP, they naturally kept $1.3 MILLION for “fees and commissions”. The RCMP only got $1.7 MILLION of the $3 MILLION handed out by the Liberals.
The transactions were recorded manually and some of the supporting documents WERE LATER DESTROYED.
The Auditor General also raised an eyebrow when she found that the RCMP spent a huge chunk of that money on six horses and two trailers. That oughta show Bin Laden who’s boss!
Canada Post
The Liberals handed out $600,000 to Canada Post so it could participate in an international stamp show. Again: international stamp show. Beware all you anthrax mailers! We’ve got cool stamps!
But wait! The Liberals, as you can now see, never give the money directly to the recipient—they laundered(?) the money through ad agencies like, in this case, Lafleur and I.D.A. Vision, who kept $78,261 of it for themselves as, you guessed it, a “commission”.
They “earned” this “commission” simply by transferring the money to Canada Post. As you and I know, Canada Post only charges 45 CENTS to mail a cheque.
BUT THERE’S MORE! Canada Post then took $516,000 of what was left over and PAID IT TO AN AD AGENCY to help “promote the project”. (What project?). What ad agency? Lafleur, of course. THAT WAS THE SAME AD AGENCY THAT GOT THE “COMMISSION” FOR TRANSFERRING THE MONEY IN THE FIRST PLACE!
And again, THERE WAS NO SIGNED CONTRACT between the Post Office and Lafleur for any of this “work”.
Other Scams
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- The Old Port of Montreal got $1.5 MILLION from the Sponsorship Fund so it could buy a new screen for its Science Center. Did they simply get a cheque? No! You could probably complete the next sentence! The money was funneled through Lafleur and Media/I.D.A. Vision, which kept $225,000 in “commissions”.
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- Ad agency Groupaction received a huge $330,000 contract from Public Works Canada to develop “a communications strategy” for the new firearms legislation. WHERE IS THE “STRATEGY”? NOWHERE! No strategy, no report, no nothing! According to the Auditor general, Groupaction took the money and that’s the end of it. Perhaps the Liberals and Paul Martin know where the money went. I’m not sure. I don’t know.
- Groupaction got another contract worth $465,000 to sponsor something called “…. [remainder of article destroyed by glitch… sorry!]
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