Premier must come clean about Sudbury by-election talks: NDP

NDP MPP for Timmins-James Bay Gilles Bisson called on the Premier during Question Period this morning to answer whether or not she briefed the Member for Sudbury Glenn Thibeault on the by-election nomination process in Sudbury. Andrew Olivier, the Liberal candidate for Sudbury, was well known to Thibeault at the time the alleged bribery took place.

Gerry Lougheed, a high-ranking Liberal fundraiser on the Sudbury campaign team, has been accused of offering bribes to Olivier so he would drop out of the by-election, thereby allowing a spot for Thibeault to campaign. The OPP has since filed two criminal charges against Lougheed.

 

“My question is to the Premier. Your Liberal operative, Mr. Lougheed, has done a lot of work for yourself and has said that he had been trying for years to get Mr. Thibeault to run in the Ontario Legislature. In the end, there was just one problem, and that was that Mr. Olivier wanted to run in that nomination. Surely this hurdle must have come up in your discussion with Mr. Thibeault. Our question simply is this: Can you confirm that you actually talked about the problems in regards to the nomination with Mr. Thibeault before he ran?” said Bisson.  

Bisson also asked to what lengths the Premier and Thibeault were willing to go to secure the nomination in Sudbury with the knowledge that Olivier had no plans to step aside.

“The facts are Mr. Thibeault had discussions with a number of Liberal operatives, including the Premier, in regards to running in the Sudbury by-election. Our question is a very simple one: Did the Premier or anyone else have discussions with Mr. Thibeault vis-à-vis the problems they were going to have when it came to the nomination process? Yes or no?” said Bisson.