If we were all paid by the Liberals a nickel for each time we heard one of them say the phrase “there was no connection”, the Liberals would need a lot of donations to meet their obligations. Luckily there are lots of firms who got Liberal Party government handouts, thus securing them as firms reliant upon the Liberals and which would then do whatever was needed to keep them in power. The circle of Liberal life is thus complete.
OTTAWA—An advertising-industry salesman said yesterday he made a $50,000 donation to the federal Liberals in 1998 because the cash-strapped party couldn’t meet its payroll in Montreal, highlighting the close ties at the time between ad agencies and the governing party.
In an interview, Alain Renaud said he was acting as an external consultant for Groupaction Marketing Inc., in addition to working as a Liberal volunteer.
Mr. Renaud said the party’s finance committee told him that the Liberals were facing a cash crunch. He said he made a registered donation of $50,000 to the party through his company, 9004-8612 Quebec Inc., in addition to other donations of $13,858 that year.
According to Elections Canada, Mr. Renaud’s total donations of $63,858 made him the seventh biggest donor to the Liberal Party of Canada in 1998, ahead of some banks.
“I did my duty for my party. . . . They couldn’t pay their employees that week,” he said.
Mr. Renaud’s comments are likely to add fuel to the controversy over the links in the 1990s between federal advertisers and the Liberal Party. The Opposition has long alleged that the ChrÃ
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