Joe Clark critical of Harper's handling of Senate scandal

Former prime minister Joe Clark says current PM Stephen Harper needs to "bring people into the facts" and tell the real story about what went on with Senator Mike Duffy and Nigel Wright, the PM's former chief of staff.

Clark has written a new book — titled How We Lead — about Canada's foreign policy, and our country's global standing. The book is quite critical about Harper's approach to international affairs. 

CBC chief correspondent Peter Mansbridge interviewed Clark on Wednesday about leadership, not only on foreign affairs, but also on management, including how he sees the Senate scandal that's been unfolding in Ottawa.

See the full interview with former prime minister Joe Clark on Mansbridge One on One this weekend

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Clark says Harper should get some advice about how to tell the story effectively.

PM: "As unlikely as it may seem, if Stephen Harper picked up the phone and called you up and said, 'I need your advice,' what would be the single piece of advice you'd give him on what was happening right now?"

JC: Right now, I think he has to bring people into the facts. That's a careful way of saying…"

PM: "It's a careful way of saying he's not telling us the real story."

JC: "And I think he needs to tell the real story and I think he needs to seek some advice as to what's the most effective way to do that....That's a question he should have asked a long time ago."

Clark also says that what really surprises him is that the party is attacking its own.

"It raises a very real question that comes back to the prime minister: if Mike Duffy has been such a problem, who appointed him? If Nigel Wright is the person they're blaming, who hired him?"

"This is very tricky ground for the prime minister and he, I think, is trapped by a process, by a use of a process that he himself created," Clark says.

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No reprieve for Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau

The Conservative majority in the Senate voted down Liberal motions Wednesday that would have sent the matter of the proposed suspensions of three senators to a committee. 

A committee hearing would have saved senators Mike Duffy, Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau from being suspended without pay in the immediate future.

The three senators are in hot water because of inappropriately claimed expenses. All have repaid thousands of dollars for disallowed housing and travel claims. Brazeau's wages are being garnisheed and he hasn't yet completed his repayment.

The votes on Wednesday evening mean the three won't be able to argue their cases, with their lawyers present,  before a Senate committee of their peers that would have eventually made recommendations about whether they deserve to be suspended.

Their fate remains in the hands of the entire Senate, which has been debating their proposed suspensions for over a week, often late into the night.

Duffy,  Wallin and Brazeau are still facing motions that would strip them of their salaries as well as the use of their offices and cellphones, and any travel. Those final motions may not be voted on until Friday, or even early next week.

A motion to keep health benefits

Earlier in the day, the government leadership in the Senate introduced proposals that would allow the three senators to keep their health benefits and life insurance if they are suspended from the Senate without pay.

The various procedural wranglings mean most Conservative senators will miss their party's national policy convention in Calgary, which begins Thursday afternoon and ends Saturday, unless there is an adjournment that would allow them to attend.

Tuesday night, Conservative Senate leader Claude Carignan told reporters who were waiting outside the Senate chamber that Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau would have a difficult time obtaining private life insurance if they are suspended for two years. 

Asked why he was agreeable to the three keeping their benefits, Carignan said, "Because it's logical," implying the Senate was contemplating suspending the three senators, not expelling them completely.

Carignan added there was no plan to shorten the length of the proposed suspensions, as had been rumoured.

Conservative Senator Hugh Segal, an old friend of Wallin's who argued in her defence this week, agreed there would be "a touch of humanity" allowing the three senators to keep benefits and insurance, but he's still troubled by "the lack of due process," if they end up getting suspended without pay before they get "a fair hearing." 

Duffy has had serious heart problems and Wallin is a former cancer patient. In an impassioned speech to the Senate last week, Duffy plaintively asked, "Who will pay for my heart drugs?"

Asked whether Conservative senators might soften and go for shorter suspensions, Segal said, "I have no reason to believe that, I'm afraid."

The Senate adjourned shortly after 6 p.m. Wednesday, and will sit again Thursday at 2 p.m.

3 main motions on table

There are three main motions on the table to give each senator a suspension of two years, around the time a general election is expected to be held.

Carignan bears some responsibility for the time the decision is taking because he introduced his own motions to suspend his three colleagues early last week. Days later, he brought in a government motion to limit debate time on the proposed suspensions.

However, on Wednesday, the Senate Speaker Noel Kinsella ruled Carignan couldn't impose a government motion on his own private motions.

Liberal Senate leader James Cowan told reporters in the Senate foyer that the Conservatives are trying to force an end to the debate because, he said, Harper's coverup is unravelling.

Harper has been on his feet in question period all week, attempting to thwart opposition attacks over his former chief of staff's payment of Duffy's $90,000 tab for inappropriate claims and arrangement to have the Conservative Party pay Duffy's legal fees.

However, Conservative MP Jay Aspin said Wednesday, "It's all the Liberals' fault, if they'd just get out of the way we could get rid of these senators."

Even some senators are having a hard time following the procedural twists and turns in the chamber.

Conservative Senator Don Meredith said Tuesday during the debate, "We've got sub-motions before us, we've got motions and counter-motions."

Liberal Senator Joseph Day said, "You almost need a scorecard to keep on top of this."

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Tories paying own way for Conservative convention

While questions continue to swirl about the expense claims of three Tory senators, Conservatives attending this weekend's national party convention in Calgary will be paying their own costs.

"Conservative MPs will be paying their own way to attend the Conservative Party National Convention in Calgary," a spokesperson for government whip John Duncan confirmed in an email to CBC News.

According to House of Commons rules, members of Parliament are allowed to be reimbursed for expenses related to national caucus meetings that occur at national conventions. But the Tories are not holding a national caucus meeting in Calgary.

Tory senators will also be paying their own way to the national convention. But with costs for admission up to $900, and Calgary considered an expensive city, some may be having second thoughts about attending.

Wednesdays with Kady has moved to a new day - and city.

But just this once.

Join Kady O'Malley at noon ET Thursday live from Calgary, where Conservative delegates, MPs and supporters will be gathering for their weekend convention.

Bring your questions and comments and join us for the live chat at cbc.ca/politics

"At this particular time from a financial perspective, the way it's set up this year, I have financial responsibilities in terms of my life and my family and I think my time would be best served doing what I should be doing as a senator," said Conservative Senator Larry Smith, who told CBC News that he hadn't planned on going.

It's also unclear whether the bad press from the Senate scandal may have senators reconsidering their attendance. But former government leader in the Senate Marjory LeBreton insisted that senators have not been told to stay home from the convention.

"No one has been told not to go. That is false," LeBreton wrote in an email to Global News. "The only concern is whether we will be wrapped up in time in the Senate to catch our flights." 

The various procedural wranglings over debate motions on whether to suspend senators Mike Duffy, Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau over their Senate expense claims could mean some Conservative senators will miss the convention.

But Conservative Party president John Walsh told The Canadian Press that approximately 3,000 members are expected to attend Prime Minister Stephen Harper's speech Friday evening — a record turnout for the movement, particularly considering the event was postponed by spring flooding in Alberta.

"Our party is pretty dedicated at our conventions to talking about policy and constitutional amendments, we spend a lot of time in our agenda doing that, and our people are very eager to do that," Walsh said in an interview.

"Our membership is a very loyal membership, they want to come and hear from the prime minister, they want to come and meet caucus members to be able to talk about the issues."

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Wright-Duffy cheque affair: Harper’s explanations changing by the day

The prime minister doesn't need to give voice to his exasperation with the Senate expense scandal as he heads to Calgary for a two-day policy convention.

Stephen Harper pantomimes his frustration almost every time he rises in the Commons to answer another barbed question.

He raises his palms heavenward, shakes his head balefully and repeats how "crystal clear" he's been since May in telling Senator Mike Duffy that he had to repay $90,000 in improperly claimed living expenses, in saying his former chief of staff resigned for deciding, on his own, to pay that money back out of his own pocket, and in reiterating that — had he known — he would have directed Nigel Wright not to do it in the first place.

Written down like that, it does all seem crystal clear. Except the prime minister has said more than that. Much, much more. And what he's said about Wright, in particular, keeps changing. From month to month, week to week, day to day.

Here's what Harper said May 19 in accepting Wright's resignation for his role in the Duffy affair:

"I accept that Nigel believed he was acting in the public interest, but I understand the decision he has taken to resign. I want to thank Nigel for his tremendous contribution to our government over the past two and a half years."

Compare that with what the prime minister said in a radio interview on Monday:

"As you know, I had a chief of staff who made an inappropriate payment to Mr. Duffy. He was dismissed."

Or to what Harper told the Commons on Tuesday.

"Once again, Mr. Speaker, on our side, there is one person responsible for this deception, and that person is Mr. Wright. Mr Wright by his own admission. For that reason, Mr. Wright no longer works for us."

Changing message

Fired or resigned. Acted in the public interest, or out of deception. These are just two examples of Harper's changing answers. And that makes the prime minister a key player in keeping the Senate scandal alive heading into a policy convention that was supposed to lift the party away from the Senate morass and into the orbit of priorities they can campaign on in 2015.

Still, turning on your former chief of staff seems out of sync for a leader who demands absolute loyalty from his people, and a strict adherence to message control.

When Wright first resigned, a number of his former colleagues praised his integrity, work ethic and honesty. They called his decision to personally repay Duffy's expenses a regrettable error.

Those same people are silent now as Harper dismantles Wright's reputation.

Oxford defines to deceive as to "deliberately cause (someone) to believe that something is not true, especially for personal gain."

There's been no suggestion Wright was motivated by personal gain. In fact, just the opposite is true. He dashed off a payment in an attempt make a political problem go away for the prime minister.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper speaks with Senator Claude Carignan, the Leader of the Government in the Senate, following a party caucus on Parliament Hill on Oct. 30. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)

Harper's new lines suggest he's trying to put more distance between himself and the actions of his former chief of staff. He is doing so using the bully pulpit of his office and the privilege attached to anything said in the Commons.

In the meantime, the facts in the Duffy-Wright affair are not yet fully known. The RCMP continue to investigate.

In reality, Harper and the Conservatives want to deflect attention from him, and to keep it on the Senate where the debate over whether to suspend Duffy, Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau without pay drags on and on.

Their punishment was to have been meted out before this weekend's convention. It was supposed to allow Harper to tell party faithful that these three senators had been held accountable for misusing taxpayers' money.

Instead, Harper spent the week fending off questions about his own role, and his changing answers.

At the crossroads

The Senate isn't on the official agenda in Calgary, but Conservatives acknowledge the expenses controversy and Wright-Duffy affair will play out in the hallways among party supporters who were promised Senate reform by Harper, not scandal.

It's also the focus of a daylong panel discussion leading into the convention, sponsored by former Reform Party leader Preston Manning's foundation, which says the movement to change the Senate is at a crossroads.

"It's time to assess where we've been, where we are and where we are headed," the foundation says in promoting the event.

How the prime minister deals with the Senate question is another matter.

Harper will address the convention Friday night. Certainly some of his advisers are suggesting he steer clear of the subject altogether. Senior cabinet ministers are already signalling the focus of the speech will be on the Conservatives most familiar calling card.

"I think Canadians expect us to focus on the issues that matter to them and their lives," Treasury Board President Tony Clement said Wednesday after the Conservatives' weekly caucus meeting. "And we are doing so. The biggest trade agreement in the history of our country. Focusing on jobs. That's what people care about."

Only the media, he suggested, cares about the Wright-Duffy affair, or whether the prime minister's former right-hand man betrayed him.

Pressed for an answer, Clement stuck to what is now the approved message.

"The prime minister has been clear on that."

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Robocalls investigator says witnesses fear harassment

Witnesses who gave key evidence against former Conservative campaign worker Michael Sona are reluctant to continue co-operating with an investigation by Elections Canada, says the lead investigator in the robocalls case, because of harassment and fear of losing their jobs.

Sona, who handled media relations for the 2011 Conservative campaign for Marty Burke, has been charged with wilfully preventing or trying to prevent a voter from casting a ballot.

The 25-year-old remains the only person charged following an investigation into allegedly misleading phone calls that went out in the riding of Guelph, Ont., during the federal election in 2011.

In an affidavit filed in court on Oct. 24, Allan Mathews, the investigator for the office of the commissioner of Canada elections, said the publicity surrounding the high-profile case is having a "chilling effect" on the witnesses. 

While the names of the witnesses are subject to a temporary publication ban, Mathews described the witnesses as "employed by or through a political party" and as "junior political staff."

Two witnesses "expressed concerns that having any publicized involvement with the 'robocalls' could risk their employment," Mathews said in the sworn affidavit.

The sworn affidavit by Mathews comes in response to a request by the CBC, the Ottawa Citizen and Global News to have a publication ban lifted on a previous document that laid out evidence against Sona. The media outlets are challenging the ban at a hearing on Nov. 13.

Witness harassment and reluctance to co-operate

On Wednesday, Crown prosecutor James Clark filed a statement of facts warning that not only is there "evidence that harassment of witnesses is already occurring" but "Mr. Sona himself has demonstrated that he will attack these witnesses personally, persistently, and publicly once their names can be published."

The witnesses in question are the ones who have provided "the most prejudicial evidence against Mr. Sona," the Crown prosecutor said.

Clark warned that Sona has begun to make "negative comments on social media regarding the yet unnamed witnesses, stating that they have 'credibility problems' and implying that they have lied and misled investigators in order to secure promotions."

One key witness told Mathews, the investigator, that "fear" of causing a politically embarrassing situation for the minister he worked for was one of the reasons why he did not come forward sooner with information.

"You let your fear run with you and then that would be embarrassing for the minister. I would say that was also a huge primary fear of mine," the witness told Mathews.

The lead investigator said the first witness also reported receiving a Facebook message from an acquaintance of Sona's accusing him of being a liar and calling into question his character as a result of his co-operation with the Elections Canada investigation.

Mathews said the distant acquaintance has approached him in the past on the basis of knowing Sona.

Temporary publication ban upheld

The Crown prosecutor, in his statement of facts, warned against the publication of the witnesses' names, saying that it would "increase witness reluctance to participate in this case and similar cases forward, and will inevitably lead to persistent harassment of these witnesses."

For that reason, Clark said, there is no harm in delaying the publication of the witnesses' names until the trial.

Mathews, the lead investigator, said a second witness was "very reluctant" to provide him with information and did so only because the first witness had involved him in the investigation.

The first witness quoted the second witness as saying that he would "probably have a hard time finding a job after … because nobody likes the media attention."

Mathews said he attempted to interview approximately 11 people who worked on Burke's election campaign team but most did not co-operate.

One worker who Mathews said was "directly involved" with access and use of the party's database "flatly refused to co-operate" for fear of having his name made public.

Mathews said he heard that same concern from "several" other workers. Two others declined to co-operate without giving Mathews any specific reason.

In the affidavit, Mathews said the one worker who agreed to co-operate told him that she has altered her C.V. to avoid any link to the Burke campaign on which she worked, "for fear of the negative impact" of being associated with the robocalls.

Sona is due in court for a pre-trial or a trial on June 2, 2014.

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Harper lashes back over Senate scandal questions

Growing visibly more angry with every allegation coming from a senator that he appointed, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said during question period on Tuesday that Mike Duffy has shown no remorse for claiming ineligible expenses and should be removed from the Senate.

Harper's remarks came a day after the former Conservative dropped a second bombshell, saying there was not one but two cheques cut to him by Harper's former chief of staff.

Duffy told the Senate on Monday that Nigel Wright, Harper's former chief of staff, arranged to have his legal fees paid by the Conservative Party — in addition to the $90,000 cheque Wright gave Duffy to repay his ineligible expenses.

"The reality is," Harper said on Tuesday, "that Mr. Duffy still has not paid a cent back to the taxpayers of Canada. He should be paying that money back."

'On our side, there is one person responsible for this deception. That person is Mr. Wright.'— Prime Minister Stephen Harper

"The fact that he hasn't, the fact that he shows absolutely no regret for his actions, and the fact that he has told untruths about his actions means that he should be removed from the public payroll," Harper said.

The prime minister has maintained all along that he knew nothing about the $90,000 cheque that his right-hand man gave to Duffy.

On Tuesday, the prime minister took direct aim at his former chief of staff, telling the Commons, "On our side, there is one person responsible for this deception. That person is Mr. Wright."

"It is Mr. Wright by his own admission. For that reason, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Wright no longer works for us. Mr. Duffy shouldn't either," Harper said.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair once again peppered the prime minister with sharp questions over the Duffy-Wright affair, during question period on Tuesday, Oct. 29, 2013. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

The prime minister did not, however, deny on Tuesday that the party cut Duffy a second cheque to cover his legal fees.

"That is a regular practice. The party regularly reimburses members of its caucus for valid legal expenses — as do other parties," Harper said.

Duffy's claim that he had paid back his ineligible expenses using his own funds was "the story of Mr. Duffy and Mr. Wright," Harper said. 

"Mr. Duffy should be removed from the Senate."

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair continued to pepper the prime minister with sharp questions on Tuesday.

If Duffy's expenses were "inappropriate," as Harper said again Tuesday, why did the Conservative Party pay for the senator's legal fees? Mulcair asked.

Harper did not directly answer the question, saying only that he has said "it was inappropriate all along."

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Duffy, Wallin, Brazeau may keep medical benefits

Procedural wrangling in the Senate means a vote on whether three senators should be suspended and lose their pay won't happen until at least Friday, but amendments proposed late last night may allow them to keep their medical benefits even if they're suspended.

There are three motions on the table to suspend Senators Mike Duffy, Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau, and strip them of their salaries, office use and benefits because of inappropriately claimed expenses. The suspensions would last for two years, when the general election is expected to be held.

Claude Carignan, the Conservative Senate leader, bears some responsibility for the delay because he introduced motions to suspend his three colleagues last week, and then brought in another motion to limit debate time on his own motions.

On Tuesday, Conservative Senate deputy leader Senator Yonah Martin took the next step of moving the closure motion, so that debate could begin.

Liberal Senator Joan Fraser immediately raised a point of order arguing the motion to limit debate is a government motion for time allocation, yet the three motions to suspend the senators were introduced as non-government motions. She contended that the two cannot be mixed, and trying to do so constitutes "a dangerous precedent."

Liberal Senate Leader James Cowan told reporters in the Senate foyer that the Conservatives are trying to end the debate because, he said, Harper's coverup is unravelling.

The motion to limit debate was supposed to be moved Monday, but for some reason was not, meaning the vote on the suspensions will take place well after the Conservative Party's national policy convention in Calgary has begun.

The Senate finally adjourned at 11 p.m. ET Tuesday after the government side tried to move amendments that would allow the three senators to keep their medical benefits during suspension. Unanimous consent to introduce them was denied, so those amendments will have to wait until debate resumes Wednesday at 2 p.m. ET.

Afterward, Carignan said he supported the amendments because it would be difficult for the three senators to obtain private medical insurance during their suspensions, which are intended to last only until the end of the session, about two years. Carignan said the amendments would not change the length of the suspensions.

But Conservative Senator Hugh Segal, who has defended Wallin in recent weeks, said the amendments don't address the "core question" of "a violation of due process.

"And while it shows a touch of humanity that people who might be ill or otherwise might be able to use their medical plan, the core violation of due process is unchanged by the amendment, therefore my view about the process and the degree to which it's a violation of natural justice is unchanged as well," he told reporters as he left the upper chamber late Tuesday.

The Senate is deliberating in the wake of Duffy's dramatic revelation Monday that he had received not one cheque related to ineligible expenses he claimed, but "at least two" via the Prime Minister's Office.

In a strongly worded speech earlier this week, Duffy explained that not only had the prime minister's former chief of staff, Nigel Wright, given him $90,000 to repay his housing claims, but the Conservative Party's lawyer had transferred $13,500 to Duffy's lawyer.

That second cheque, Duffy told the Senate, was to pay the legal fees run up as he finessed a cover story with the PMO that he was voluntarily repaying money using a personal loan from his own bank.

While question period in the House of Commons on Tuesday included opposition queries about the ethics of the PMO allegedly financing a legal deal for Duffy meant to deceive the public, the Senate is taken up with what to do with the three senators who have had to pay back inappropriately claimed expenses.

At a Conservative Senate caucus meeting Tuesday morning, senators discussed whether they could accept any compromises in the suspension motions. Topics ranged from whether some suspensions should be a year or a year and a half long, rather than two years, and whether health benefits should stay in place during the suspensions.

Up for discussion, as well, is a motion from the Liberals that would send the suspension issues to a Senate committee where Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau could make presentations, ask and be asked question and be represented by lawyers.

Meanwhile, Conservative Senator Larry Smith confirmed he and more than a dozen other senators were briefed by officials from the auditor general's office Tuesday morning about audits about to be conducted on all senators' spending.

It's not known whether Michael Ferguson will extend the audits back over a period of years, but senators who are contemplating cutting the pay of three of their colleagues as a penalty for making inappropriate expense claims must realize a precedent could be set that could apply to other senators in the future.

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Lax security at Canada Revenue leads to privacy breaches

The privacy watchdog says weak security practices at the federal tax office led to thousands of files being inappropriately accessed for years without detection.

Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart has more than a dozen recommendations — including better monitoring of employee access rights — to ensure the Canada Revenue Agency protects sensitive information.

"Canadians deserve to have their personal information protected, particularly when they provide it to the government under legal compulsion," Stoddart said in a news release Tuesday.

'Canadians deserve to have their personal information protected, particularly when they provide it to the government under legal compulsion'- Federal privacy watchdog Jennifer Stoddart

She tabled a special audit of the revenue agency along with her annual report on compliance with the Privacy Act, the law that governs how federal agencies handle personal information.

For the second year in a row, all-time highs were set for both privacy complaints about federal organizations as well as data breaches reported by departments and agencies.

From April 2012 to the end of March, Stoddart received 2,273 complaints from the public, up from 986 over the same period a year before.

Much of the increase stemmed from two highly publicized data breaches involving Employment and Social Development Canada and the Justice Department.

Federal Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart says her office received 2,273 privacy complaints from the public between April 2012 to the end of March 2013 - up from 986 complaints over the same period the year before. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)

Stoddart also flagged elements of the Canada-U.S. perimeter security pact, intended to smooth the passage of goods and people across the 49th parallel while beefing up continental defences.

She expressed concern about plans to keep information for 75 years once it's collected by border officials under a new entry-exit system that will track the movements of travellers.

Stoddart also objected to an absence of signs informing people they might be subject to detention, questioning or searches in areas including departure lounges or shipping terminals — part of a plan to extend the powers of Canada Border Services Agency officers.

"Perimeter security is and will remain an important priority for the government," Stoddart said in the release. "Our office has joined with our provincial and territorial colleagues in raising the need to ensure that the standards and values behind our privacy laws are not diminished."

Stoddart leaves the privacy commissioner's post later this year. A successor has not been named.

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Métis and non-status Indians defend victory in court

The Federal Court of Appeal is being asked to overturn a historic victory that had granted Métis and non-status Indians the right to be treated as "Indians" under the Constitution Act.

After 12 years of legal wrangling, the case finally went to trial in May 2011. It took the Federal Court judge a year and a half to release his ruling that approximately 600,000 Métis and non-status Indians fall under federal jurisdiction. The decision meant they could negotiate access to federal programs and services long denied to them.

'The Métis and non-status Indian people, lacking even the protection of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, are far more exposed to discrimination and other social disabilities. It is true today that in the absence of federal initiative in this field they are the most disadvantaged of all Canadian citizens.'— Federal Court Judge Michael Phelan, quoting government documents

But this past spring, the federal government appealed. It said the decision to do so was not taken lightly and came after careful consideration. The appeal is being heard this week.

"What they're doing is putting off the inevitable," said Ron Swain, the national vice-chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, or CAP, in an interview with CBC News. "We won the very first time. We're going to win in appeal. We'll win all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. Eventually our government has to sit down and negotiate."

Métis and non-status Indians have argued that because neither the provinces nor Ottawa would accept jurisdiction, they fell through the cracks.

"It's very hard to make progress when you don't have proper schooling, when you don't have proper health care," said Joseph Magnet, the lead lawyer representing CAP at the hearing. "And we're very hopeful that the court will agree with us about that and that this will provide the stimulus needed for change."

The trial judge highlighted, in his 175-page judgment, the real effects of a lack of status, when he quoted an internal government document on the matter: "The Métis and non-status Indian people, lacking even the protection of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, are far more exposed to discrimination and other social disabilities. It is true today that in the absence of federal initiative in this field they are the most disadvantaged of all Canadian citizens."

The federal government lawyers, however, in submissions at the hearing Tuesday, argued that the trial judge erred in his judgment and that the framers of the Constitution did not intend Métis to be part of Section 91(24) of the act, which spells out that "Indians" are the exclusive jurisdiction of the federal government.

The case dates back to 1999 when well-known Métis ​leader Harry Daniels, along with several non-status Indians, took the federal government to court, alleging they were being discriminated against because they were not considered "Indians" under the Constitution. Daniels has since died, but the case continued and many believe it will end up at the Supreme Court.

"There's not a one-size-fits-all solution. It requires some fortitude, some imagination, some resources, some goodwill and some hard work," lawyer Magnet said. "And apparently the government needs also a court to tell it to get started."

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Young politicians no longer a novelty in Canada

At age 30, David Joanasie is the youngest person to be elected to the Nunavut legislature, but by the current standards in the House of Commons and some of the country's provincial legislatures, the newly elected MLA who won a seat Monday night in the territory's fourth election is long in the tooth.

Entering politics at a young age is nothing new. Joe Clark was just 39 when he became prime minister of the country, having been first elected to Parliament at age 33 in 1972. Bob Rae won his first seat in the House of Commons at age 30 as an NDP MP in a 1978 federal byelection.

We take a look at some recently elected politicians who've attracted attention for their young age.

Who did we miss?

Let us know about the young politicians making news in your region: community@cbc.ca

Pierre Luc Dessault, NDP MP, Sherbrooke (Born: May 31, 1991) — The youngest MP in Canada's history, Dessault was part of the NDP's crop of young, fresh-faced MPs elected in the May 2011 election. He was a few weeks shy of his 20th birthday when he was elected and has recently been chosen to chair the government operation and estimates committee.

The McGill Four — Charmaine Borg (Born: Nov. 3, 1990), Matthew Dubé (Born: May 3, 1988), Mylène Freeman (Born: March 7, 1989) and Laurin Liu (Born: Nov. 13, 1990) got their nickname because when they were elected as NDP MPs in Quebec in May 2011, three of them were still enrolled as students at McGill University and the fourth had only just graduated. All were in their early 20s at the time. 

Andrew Scheer, Conservative MP for Regina-Qu'Appelle, Sask. (Born: May 20, 1979) — Scheer was elected in June 2004 at the age of 25 and made history seven years later when he became the youngest Speaker of the House.

Niki Ashton made her first failed bid for a seat in the House of Commons at age 23. She lost the 2006 election, but ran again two years later and became the NDP MP for Churchill, Man. (Liam Richards/Canadian Press)

Niki Ashton, NDP MP for Churchill, Man. (Born: Sept. 9, 1982) — Ashton was just 23 when she made her first bid for a seat in the House of Commons in 2006. She lost that election but was successful two years later. A mere four years after that, she made a bid for the leadership of her party, promising a new kind of politics that would inspire people of her generation. She lost the race to replace Jack Layton but earned a spot in winning candidate Tom Mulcair's shadow cabinet, heading up the portfolio devoted to women's issues.

Ruth Ellen Brosseau, NDP MP for Berthier-Maskinongé, Que. (Born: April 26, 1984) — Brosseau grabbed headlines not only for her relatively young age during the 2011 election campaign but also when her legitimacy as a candidate was questioned. The then 28-year-old was criticized for not living in the riding she was seeking to represent, going to Las Vegas on vacation during the campaign and accused of not having her nomination papers in order. She survived those scandals and continues to serve in Parliament.

Pierre Poilievre was 25 when he was elected as the Conservative MP for Nepean-Carleton, Ont. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

Pierre Poilievre, Conservative MP for Nepean-Carleton, Ont. (Born: June 3, 1979) — Poilievre was 25 when he was first elected in June 2004 and has held several high-ranking positions since then, including parliamentary secretary to the prime minister, to the minister of intergovernmental affairs and to the president of the Treasury Board; and, currently, minister of state for democratic reform.

Chris Warkentin, Conservative MP for Peace River, Alta. (Born: Nov. 20, 1978) —​ Warkentin began his political career as a member of the Reform Party and the Canadian Alliance before being elected to the House as a Conservative MP at the age of 27 in the January 2006 federal election. He chaired the standing committee on aboriginal affairs and northern development from June 2011 to September 2013.

Young politicos thriving locally, too

There have also been some notable young faces at the local, provincial and territorial level.

Canada has its share of young mayors. Luke Strimbold was 21 when he was elected mayor of Burns Lake, B.C., in November 2011 and got a literal baptism by fire when, less than two months into his term, there was an explosion at the local sawmill that destroyed the town's main employer, killed two workers and injured almost two dozen people. 

La Ronge, Sask., mayor Thomas Sierzycki was also 21 when he was elected in 2009 and, like Strimbold, still holds the position.

Edmonton's new mayor, Don Iveson, who was sworn in Tuesday, is an old fogey at 34 by comparison.

Quebec saw youngest MNA elected last year

Provincially, there are quite a few 20- and 30somethings filling the seats in the country's legislatures. Below is a small sampling of some of them.

Léo Bureau-Blouin was just 20 and a leader of Quebec's student movement when he was elected to the province's national assembly in September 2012 as the Parti Québécois MNA for the Laval-des-Rapides riding. He became the youngest person to be elected to the Quebec legislature and took the shine off other young MNAs such as the PQ's Mathieu Traversy and Dave Turcotte, who were 24 and 25, respectively, when they were elected.

Léo Bureau-Blouin is the youngest person to be elected to Quebec's national assembly. (Mathieu Belanger/Reuters)

Residents of Hammonds Plains-Lucasville, N.S., took a chance on 26-year-old Ben Jessome earlier this month, giving the Cape Breton University graduate and Liberal Party member his first full-time job by electing him to the provincial legislature. His colleague Zach Churchill was also 26 when he was elected Liberal MLA for Yarmouth. Churchill was recently chastised for using his BlackBerry in the legislature and had the smartphone confiscated by the sergeant-at-arms. He told the Halifax Herald newspaper rules that banned cellphones during sittings of the legislature were out of date and out of step with the work and lifestyle habits of his generation. He was also tossed out of the legislature for heckling NDP MLAs.

Several of New Brunswick's MLAs are in their late 20s or early 30s. Progressive Conservative MLA Ryan Riordon was around 28 when he was first elected in 2010. Current Leader of the Opposition Brian Gallant was just 30 when he was chosen to head the New Brunswick Liberals at a leadership convention in October of last year. He won a seat in the legislative assembly in a byelection this past April.

Newfoundland and Labrador MHA Christopher Mitchelmore, who made news this week when he quit the NDP caucus to sit as an independent, was just shy of his 26th birthday when he was elected to the province's house of assembly in 2011 and is currently the youngest member of the province's legislature.

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Who is Arthur Hamilton, the lawyer named by Mike Duffy?

When the Conservative Party finds itself in trouble, lawyer Arthur Hamilton is often the man tasked with the troubleshooting.

A soft-spoken figure in the courtroom, his quiet intensity hints at past achievements as a high-school athlete.

A former linebacker who was recruited to play for Greenville College in Illinois, Hamilton was hit from behind, which blew out his knee and left him unable to play competitive ball.

Instead, he returned to Canada, studied at the University of Toronto and became one of the top election law experts in the country, according to colleagues.

Now, the longtime Conservative Party lawyer has seen his name surface in connection with another scandal hitting the Conservative Party: on Monday, Senator Mike Duffy alleged that Hamilton is one of the people who helped negotiate payments to cover Duffy's expenses in the long-running Senate spending scandal. Duffy said Hamilton provided a cheque for $13,560 to cover his legal fees in the matter.

Hamilton's name has also come up over:

• Accompanying witnesses in interviews with Elections Canada for the agency's investigation into misleading robocalls in Guelph, Ont., in the 2011 federal election.
• A fierce defence of six Conservative MPs against a legal challenge that would have seen them removed from office over robocalls in their ridings. The federal court judge in the case said the respondent side of the case, led by Hamilton, engaged in "trench warfare" and made little effort to help Elections Canada investigate the allegations.

The married father of five-year-old twins still lives in his hometown in Toronto's east end. He has mainly kept a low profile, always declining interview requests, and politely refusing to go on television to summarize arguments made in high-profile but camera-free courtrooms.

Hamilton declined to comment on Duffy's allegations.

A spokesman for the Conservative Party suggested it's possible a cheque was cut to cover Duffy's legal expenses.

"At the time these legal expenses were incurred and paid, Mike Duffy was a member of the Conservative caucus. The Conservative Party sometimes assists members of caucus with legal expenses," Cory Hann said in an email to CBC News.

Long history with Conservative Party

Hamilton eschews coffee and alcohol, despite working punishing 16-hour days handling energy and resource regulation cases, as well as an increasing number of Conservative Party legal cases.

The Bay Street lawyer — Hamilton is a partner at Cassels Brock —  has been involved with the Conservative Party from its inception, Conservative MP Erin O'Toole said in an interview with CBC News.

Hamilton helped with the legal work of merging the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservatives, and represented the party against a legal challenge mounted by former PC cabinet minister Sinclair Stevens. 

"I think Arthur's strong ability to litigate the case well, and the results were very positive, that I think led to him becoming very well-regarded in the party and with the leadership of the party," said O'Toole, a friend of Hamilton's since 2002.

Hamilton went on to represent the party as an intervener at the Gomery Commission in 2004 and 2005, and has been visible in smaller controversies prior to now, including being named in a lawsuit by former cabinet minister Helena Guergis (that suit was thrown out of court).

His zealous commitment to his client, however, has raised eyebrows.

While colleagues from the party and from his law firm agreed to interviews, it was tough to find a lawyer on the opposite side of the courtroom to speak on the record.

'Trench warfare'

Last winter, Hamilton led the response in the Federal Court for six Conservative MPs who saw their seats challenged. Ted Frankel, a partner at Cassels Brock, worked with Hamilton on the case.

"There aren't many who do elections law in Canada. Arthur is one of the leaders in that field," said Frankel, who previously worked with Jack Siegel, a lawyer who has represented the Liberals on election law issues.

"Arthur is incredibly hard-working and he has an intensity that I think is pretty much unmatched by any other lawyer I've ever encountered."

That intensity led to some heated moments in the courtroom after Hamilton questioned the political leaning of a polling expert and accused the lawyer for the applicants of launching the case for political "payback." 

Federal Court Judge Richard Mosley didn't overturn the election results, although he found that voter fraud occurred. But he did use the ruling to take to the Conservatives to task, represented by Hamilton.

"These proceedings have had partisan overtones from the outset. That was particularly evident in the submissions of the respondent MPs," Mosley wrote.

"In reviewing the procedural history and the evidence and considering the arguments advanced by the parties at the hearing, it has seemed to me that the applicants sought to achieve and hold the high ground of promoting the integrity of the electoral process while the respondent MPs engaged in trench warfare in an effort to prevent this case from coming to a hearing on the merits." 

Frankel describes Hamilton as a social person and someone who's a "very, very strong proponent of the associates" (the more junior lawyers).

Identifies 'very strongly with the Conservative Party'

It may not surprise his detractors to hear that Hamilton is close to Jenni Byrne and Fred Delorey, respectively Prime Minister Stephen Harper's deputy chief of staff and the party's director of political operations. Both senior officials are known as staunch partisans.

Frankel says the zealous approach to defending his clients is one lawyers are taught to adopt on behalf of every client.

"But I think it comes even easier because he does identify very strongly with the Conservative Party and with the things that the prime minister wants to accomplish," Frankel said.

"He's always working hard, whether it's a big or a small file. He's not one of those people who's going to be caught napping on any sort of file. He's always working every possible angle."

O'Toole and Frankel both praised Hamilton as principled and loyal.

Hamilton could have kept his athletic scholarship to Greenville, O'Toole said, even after his injury, but felt he would be taking a spot away at a small college that could have offered it to someone else. 

"So he stepped away and returned to Canada. He's very much a person that will make decisions on principle and stand by them, which is what I like about him," O'Toole said.

As described by Frankel and O'Toole, Hamilton is a born advocate with a long memory. Those things fuel him more than anything else.

"Especially when people will be on one side or the other in a political argument or debate or in a courtroom, he has a long memory," O'Toole said.

"He doesn't take things personally, like a loss or anything like that, but I think he holds onto these things and probably finds motivation from them."

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Mike Duffy drops another bombshell: there were 2 cheques

Senator Mike Duffy let loose in the Senate again Monday, alleging the prime minister's former chief of staff arranged for not one cheque to him, but two.

Duffy told the Senate he has a cheque, negotiated by Nigel Wright, in the amount of $13,500 to pay for his legal fees, on top of the $90,000 from Wright to be used to repay his expenses. Duffy said he has the emails and the cheque stub to prove it, adding the $13,500 was paid by the Conservative Party's top lawyer, Arthur Hamilton.

"That's right," thundered Duffy. "One cheque from Nigel Wright? No, ladies and gentlemen, there were two cheques, at least two cheques."

The cheque, tabled by Duffy Monday, is signed by Hamilton, and made out to Duffy's lawyer's law firm.

Later on Monday, the communications director for the Conservative Party confirmed it had paid Duffy's legal fees. In an email to CBC News, Hann wrote, "At the time these legal expenses were incurred and paid, Mike Duffy was a member of the Conservative caucus. The Conservative Party sometimes assists members of caucus with legal expenses."

Subsequently, a spokesman for the prime minister issued a statement reacting to Duffy's revelation about how his legal bills were paid by Hamilton. Jason MacDonald said, "Nigel Wright is on the record naming those he informed of his arrangement with Mr. Duffy, and he's assumed sole responsibility for his actions. The prime minister was not aware of the arrangement and had it been presented to him he would not have approved of such a scheme. "

Although Wright's lawyer named four people who knew of the cheque to Duffy, he did not name Hamilton.

'Independent senators or PMO puppets?'

Duffy, even more of a showman than he was in his first blast in the Senate a week ago, said he was once again disobeying doctors' orders by submitting himself to stress, "toxic to my heart." 

He'd just come directly from Ottawa's Heart Institute, he said, and for a few seconds he plugged the cardiovascular centre, suggesting donations would be worthwhile, before saying, "Maybe that's not in order."

Once again, Duffy didn't seem frail, but on top of his game, his voice booming through the Senate chamber. "They suggested a pattern of abuse," he said of the charges against him. "A pattern," he repeated, his tone reflecting the insult of that word.

"Are we independent senators or PMO puppets?' roared Duffy, referring to the machinations of the Prime Minister's Office.

His address was full of rhetorical flourishes as he repeatedly asked questions he would then answer himself, conjuring up dialogue he imagined had happened.

"Well, guess what?" he asked. "The PMO didn't like that. Duffy wants to go public? We'll fix him."

Taking aim, Duffy brought up Senator Carolyn Stewart Olsen, Harper's former press secretary. Wright wrote him, he said, assuring him his expense claims were proper, saying, "I'm told you complied with all the applicable rules and there would be several senators with similar arrangements."

Was Wright referring to Stewart Olsen, Duffy asked, a senator appointed to represent New Brunswick, who, he said, "took two years to move from her home in Ottawa to her home in New Brunswick."

Stewart Olsen, who just resigned from the Senate internal economy committee that passed judgment on Duffy's expenses, has denied she has been asked to repay any money to the Senate.

'Email chain'

Duffy referred several times to an "email chain" he said is in the hands now of his lawyer and, he hopes, the RCMP. The emails, he said, would show the involvement of not only Hamilton, but former PMO lawyer Benjamin Perrin, who Duffy said "is actively involved in vetting resolutions for the party's national policy meeting in Calgary."

Duffy said what he called "this monstrous fraud" against him was a creation of the PMO from the beginning.

"Have you heard enough," asked Duffy, "or do you want to hear more?" as senators in the chamber listened.

Duffy overran the 15 minutes he was allowed to speak, but the Speaker granted him a few more minutes.

Invoking the Magna Carta and former prime minister John Diefenbaker's bill of rights, Duffy urged the government leadership in the Senate to withdraw these "dangerous and anti-democratic motions, declare victory and go off to Calgary to celebrate the government's many substantial achievements for Canadians."

Duffy also said what he called mistakes made in filing his expenses, excluding the housing allowance related to his claim to have a primary residence in P.E.I., amounted to only $2 a piece, "the price of a Tim's," he said, considering he also undercharged for some filings

On Monday, Wallin, who was present in the Senate chamber but who did not speak, tabled transcripts from two August meetings of the Senate internal economy meeting. One gathering was attended by the Deloitte auditors; the other was a discussion of the committee itself of Wallin's expenses.

Brazeau appeared on CBC News Network's Power & Politics, telling host Evan Solomon that Claude Carignan, the government Senate leader, told him privately that if he apologized, his proposed suspension might be reduced to one year, rather than two. Brazeau also said that although he is under investigation by the RCMP, he has not been interviewed or approached by them.

Email with the PMO

During the Politics& Politics broadcast, Soloman received an envelope containing an email exchange that is allegedly between Duffy and a former PMO staffer, Chris Woodcock. These emails were not tabled Monday by Duffy.

Woodcock, who now works elsewhere in government, is said to be one of three PMO staffers who had knowledge of the agreement for Wright to personally repay Duffy's expenses.

Woodcock wrote to Duffy shortly before midnight on May 14, the same evening a CTV News broadcast revealed Duffy's expenses had been repaid by Wright. He asked if Duffy had disclosed to the Senate ethics officer if he'd received a gift or loan, referring to Wright's cheque.

"No," Duffy replied the next morning, "Anyone who asked was told the truth: that I paid with a personal cheque on my RBC account."

The emails may have been leaked to discredit Duffy by attempting to prove he wasn't telling the truth to someone within the PMO.  However, Duffy may have been using what he has described as his "communications lines" or "scenario" in which he would publicly claim he had personally repaid the $90,000 he owed for housing expenses.

Duffy's latest broadsides against the PMO and Conservative Senate leaders came after CBC News learned there will be no decision Monday on a change to the motions to suspend senators Brazeau, Duffy and Wallin without pay over their expense claims.

Sen. Mike Duffy takes the elevator as he arrives at the Senate on Parliament Hill Monday, October 28, 2013. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

The Senate has been debating facing motions put forward by Carignan, the government Senate leader, last Tuesday that would strip the three of their pay, office use and all benefits until the next session, about two years.

But in a caucus meeting Monday, Conservative senators discussed whether to amend the motions to allow for a more lenient penalty for three senators — one that would bar them for a shorter period of time and allow them to keep their benefits.

Another amendment proposed by Liberal Senate Leader James Cowan would refer the issues of the suspensions to a Senate committee in which Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau could make presentations, ask questions and be represented by their lawyers. However, that motion likely won't come to a vote Monday.

Also on Monday, the Conservative leadership in the Senate was supposed to move a motion that would limit debate on the suspension motions. For some reason, Carignan did not move it, and if he waits until Tuesday, a vote on the suspensions would not occur until at least Friday, well into the Conservatives' Calgary convention that begins Thursday evening.

The entire caucus, MPs and senators, are expected to attend the convention, which was postponed earlier because of the Calgary floods.

Open to amendments

Carignan himself seems open to lighter penalties, especially for Brazeau and Wallin. He told Radio-Canada that Brazeau believed he could legitimately charge expenses due to claims he lived out of town because of documents he obtained from Senate administration staff.

"I believe he didn't interpret them properly, but we see there was an element of good faith," Carignan said.

Wallin, Carignan continued, made "an impassioned plea, a good plea" before her Senate colleagues, but he seemed to draw a line at Duffy.

Duffy, said Carignan, "chose to settle political scores" in his speech to the Senate last Tuesday.

Claude Carignan, government leader in the Senate, is open to considering softer sanctions for the three senators facing suspension without pay. (Sean Kilpatrick/ Canadian Press)

However, both Harper and Senator Marjory LeBreton, the former government Senate leader, said in interviews on private broadcast stations early Monday that a majority of Conservatives favour the suspension motions as they are, without amendments.

Conservative Senator Hugh Segal, who is against the motions to suspend, said to reporters as he went into the Conservative caucus meeting Monday, "What Harper says is very important, but our oaths to our majesty to do what's right — that's more important than what a politician says."

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, talking with reporters before a meeting with private-sector economists, said he doesn't want to be distracted by answering questions about whether Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau should be suspended.

"I'm actually an advocate of abolition of the Senate." Flaherty said.  "I always have been, and I think just in this day and age to have a non-elected legislative body is an anachronism."

Documents tabled by Duffy

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Patrick Brazeau says RCMP haven't contacted him over expenses

Senator Patrick Brazeau, who is being investigated by the RCMP over allegations of breach of trust, says he has not yet been contacted by the force.

In an exclusive interview with CBC's Power & Politics, Brazeau told host Evan Solomon that he has not been approached by the RCMP nor have they taken any of his documents or contacted his office. 

According to court documents filed, the RCMP allege Brazeau committed breach of trust by filing inappropriate living and travel claims since April 2011. Brazeau maintains he has not broken any rules.

The former Conservative senator left the caucus following charges of assault and sexual assault that are before the courts.

Brazeau also reaffirmed to Solomon that he was offered what he called a "backroom deal" by Claude Carignan,  the government leader of the Senate, if he stood up in the chamber and apologized for his actions. 

Brazeau claimed that Carignan said sanctions against him would be modified. Instead of being suspended without pay for two years, the term would be reduced to one year, Brazeau claimed.

Carignan has denied that he offered Brazeau a "backroom deal," instead saying that he spoke to Brazeau out of friendship and that his words had been misinterpreted. Brazeau dismissed this suggestion as an "outright lie."

Brazeau claimed he lost favour with the PMO when he started questioning the government as to why it hadn't called a national inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women. He said that caused a rift in the Conservative caucus and began his "political downfall."

Brazeau also slammed Conservative Senator Marjory LeBreton's comments that Brazeau was "an experiment gone wrong."

"I've always known that Senator LeBreton is not one that favours the aboriginal agenda or likes aboriginal people," Brazeau said.

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The faux outrage of America's bugged allies: Neil Macdonald

Try to follow the logic here.

In the spring, former CIA contractor Edward Snowden tells the world about the true extent of America's electronic surveillance: it's just about total. Everyone's communications, everywhere, are collected and, at the very least, analyzed for patterns.

A huge number of foreign citizens are upset, as well as a lot of Americans.

So a few months later, President Barack Obama orders a review of America's foreign intelligence gathering.

That review confirms certain things that, Obama's officials are now telling reporters, the president didn't know, such as the National Security Agency's wiretapping of at least 35 world leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Obama then tells the NSA to stop bugging some of them. It's a safe bet the review told, or will tell Obama other things he didn't know, as well.

Had it not been for Snowden, who is now hiding out in Russia, President Obama would probably not know about these practices he's now reviewing and halting.

Certainly the American public wouldn't. Meaning Snowden fits the classic definition of a whistleblower.

At the same time, if it could lay its hands on Snowden, the U.S. government would lock him up.

It may not sound logical, but it is, perversely. Because this particular whistle is one America and its allies are anxious to leave unblown.

Snowden has laid out the stark difference between what the U.S. and most countries say in public and what they do behind a vigorously enforced curtain of secrecy.

Yet the whole uproar rests on a ridiculous notion: that there is, or should be, some sort of morality governing the way nations deal with each other.

Faux outrage

I've met my share of (mostly Canadian) spies over the years, and while some of them are remarkably sensitive to civil liberties, the notion of citizen privacy never even enters the equation for them.

"I'm a believer in intelligence," one of them told me the other day. "I'm not sure there are limits. Spying is a way for governments to make better decisions."

In other words, gather all the information you can, period. And let others decide what to do with it.

Americans upset at the country's electronic spying take part in a "rally against mass surveillance" in Washington on Saturday. (Jonathan Ernst / Reuters)

Fortunately for Canada it is part of the so-called Five Eyes network, along with the U.S., Britain, Australia and New Zealand.

These nations are in fact so integrated that they effectively comprise a single colossal listening organization, the most powerful in history, with America in charge.

In principle, at least, membership in the Five Eyes immunizes the individual members from being spied upon by the other Four Eyes. So the Americans aren't listening to Stephen Harper, said one of my contacts, "unless it's an emergency."

The second tier of Western surveillance expertise comprises Israel, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Norway, Italy and France.

All are proficient, say the professionals, and all spy on any target deemed to be in their national interest, whether related to security or commerce.

France has long been regarded as the most adept at stealing trade secrets.

So, "there's a lot of faux outrage out there" whenever a Snowden bomb drops, one contact says.

In fact, one of the few straightforward reactions amid all the indignation over the NSA spying came from Bernard Kouchner, the former French foreign minister (and founder of Doctors Without Borders): "Let's be honest, we eavesdrop too," he told an interviewer.

"Everyone is listening to everyone else. But we don't have the same means as the United States, which makes us jealous."

What privacy?

Another Canadian I know, who has considerable expertise in secret eavesdropping, says that when you're involved in negotiating something like a trade treaty the job is clear.

"The PM's going to say 'what's their position?' and you'd better know."

The Snowden disclosures, because Snowden worked for American intelligence, relate strictly to the Five Eyes, and have caused panic, he says, in Ottawa, London, Canberra, Wellington and, of course, Washington.

Task forces have been set up and are desperately bracing government leaders for upcoming bombshells.

Again, not because these revelations will be news to anyone in the secret world, or to politicians who have been briefed, but because of the anger they can provoke in unbriefed general populations.

Governments facing that sort of public anger have to make gestures, perhaps even serious ones. Hence the warning from European leaders about damage to trade talks, and Germany's threat to expel American diplomats who might have passed along Merkel's cellphone number.

The other danger of the Snowden disclosures, of course, is that they reveal methods that should make any sensible person more careful about what he or she says on a cellphone or landline, or in an email.

While most of us have long understood that privacy is a fading commodity, something in human nature still expects that a phone call or email is a closed communication, and we tend to behave as though it is.

That behaviour is what the electronic spies count upon, and want to preserve.

Which explains the utter silence from national leaders on the subject of surveillance. They know such work is most efficiently done in the dark, and they treasure the intelligence it produces.

As for the notion that the U.S. will stop listening to certain foreign leaders, or anyone else for that matter, reality would suggest otherwise.

Stewart Baker, a George W. Bush-era security official, described the issue last week with characteristic neoconservative bluntness.

"Even the countries we usually see as friends sometimes take actions that quite deliberately harm the United States and its interests," he wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times.

"Ten years ago, when the U.S. went to war with Iraq, France and Germany were not our allies. They were not even neutral. They actively worked with Russia and China to thwart the U.S. military's mission.

"Could they act against U.S. interests again in the future — in trade or climate change negotiations, in Syria, Libya or Iran?" he asked rhetorically.

Nearly a century ago, then U.S. statesman Henry Stimson famously said about spying that "Gentlemen don't read each other's mail."

Spies, though, aren't gentlemen. And neither are nations they serve. 

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5 new questions after Mike Duffy's Senate bombshell

As the Senate continued to mull over motions to suspend Senators Mike Duffy, Patrick Brazeau and Pamela Wallin over the expense controversy, Duffy unloaded another series of bombshell revelations Monday afternoon. 

He claimed that there were actually two cheques arranged by the prime minister's former chief of staff, Nigel Wright. The first for $90,000 to pay back Senate expenses and a second for $13,500 to pay his legal bills. 

He also claimed the Prime Minister's Office concocted a story to explain how he repaid the $90,000. The revelations raised a whole new set of questions about the ongoing scandal. 

1. Who in the PMO and outside the PMO were involved in the negotiations to repay Duffy's expenses?

When the $90,000 cheque scandal first broke, Prime Minister Stephen Harper insisted Wright acted alone in paying back Duffy's expenses and that Wright's decisions "were not communicated to me or to members of my office."

But Wright himself later informed the RCMP, which is investigating the expense controversy, that he told four people, including three members of the PMO, about the cheque he was going to write to Duffy. Those people are Conservative Senator Irving Gerstein; Wright's assistant, David van Hemmen; Chris Woodcock, then director of issues management in the PMO; and Harper's legal adviser at the time, Benjamin Perrin. 

However on Monday, Duffy alleged that another top Conservative was involved.

He told the Senate that Wright arranged to have his legal fees paid and that his lawyer received a $13,500 cheque, paid by Arthur Hamilton, the Conservative Party's top lawyer. Duffy also revealed emails and the cheque stub to back up his claims.

2. Why were Conservative party funds used to pay Duffy's legal fees?

Later on Monday, the communications director for the Conservative Party told CBC News it had paid Duffy's legal fees. 

"At the time these legal expenses were incurred and paid, Mike Duffy was a member of the Conservative caucus," Cory Hann wrote.

"The Conservative party sometimes assists members of caucus with legal expenses."

Duffy himself said the funds for his legal fees came from party donors to make an embarrassing political situation go away.

3. Did Harper know about the legal fees repayment?

Harper has insisted he did not know about Wright's $90,000 payment to Duffy. 

Jason MacDonald, a spokesman for the prime minister, issued a statement reacting to Duffy's revelation about how his legal bills were paid: "Nigel Wright is on the record naming those he informed of his arrangement with Mr. Duffy, and he's assumed sole responsibility for his actions. The prime minister was not aware of the arrangement and had it been presented to him he would not have approved of such a scheme."

But while Duffy said that the $13,500 legal fee repayment was negotiated by Wright, he suggested on Monday that the prime minister had his "legal bills fully paid."

He questioned why the prime minister would do that if he believed that Duffy's expenses were improper.

"He did this because, as I have said from the start, this was all part of his strategy, negotiated by his lawyers and the Conservative party's lawyers, to make a political situation, embarrassing to his base, go away," Duffy said. 

4. Did the PMO coach Duffy on how to explain the source of the $90,000? 

Duffy claimed that the PMO, anticipating that the media would ask where he got the $90,000 to pay his expenses back, concocted an explanation. He said when the PMO heard he had been using a line of credit to renovate his home in Cavendish, P.E.I., they suggested he go to the Royal Bank of Canada and borrow the cash to pay off that line of credit.

He alleged the PMO said that he could then tell the media that he took out a loan at the Royal Bank to pay the $90,000.

"Well, that's technically correct, we took out a loan, but that loan wasn't to repay money, the $90,000 that the PMO agreed I didn't owe," Duffy told the Senate. "That line was written by the PMO to deceive Canadians as to the real source of the $90,000."

Duffy claimed that he had "reluctantly agreed" to go along with the scheme, that the script was written and emailed to him by the PMO and that the lines he would use with the media were "rehearsed with me right up until minutes before I went on television."

CBC's Power & Politics obtained an email exchange allegedly between Duffy and former PMO staffer Chris Woodcock, a note that seemingly attempts to undermine Duffy's credibility. 

"Can you confirm whether you advised the Senate Ethics Officers of any loans/gifts involved in the March 25th repayment? Trying to cover off all the angles," Woodcock, who Wright has said knew about the $90,000 payment, wrote to Duffy on midnight of May 14, the same night the Duffy-Wright $90,000 cheque story went public.

"No," Duffy replied the next morning, "Anyone who asked was told the truth: that I paid with a personal cheque on my RBC account. Did I have help? Yes from the RBC and my wife who co-signed for the extension of my line of credit."

The email raises questions about what Duffy meant when he said he "told the truth" about the RBC loan and whether he was just sticking to the story he said was created by the PMO.

5. What's in the so-called email trail that Duffy alleges will back up his claims?  

Duffy claimed on Monday that the Senate leadership, under the direction of the PMO, wanted to destroy his credibility if he ever went public about the real source of the $90,000.

"You wait until Canadians see the email trail in the hands of my lawyers and, I hope, in the hands of the RCMP," Duffy said.

Duffy said the emails between his lawyer and the PMO and its lawyers prove that "this was a setup from the start and that I am innocent."

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Patrick Brazeau says he was offered 'backroom deal'

In a dramatic moment during a Senate debate over his suspension without pay, Senator Patrick Brazeau said he was offered what he called a "backroom deal" by the government leader of the Senate Friday morning.

"The deal was," said Brazeau, "that if I stood in this chamber, apologized to Canadians and took responsibility for my actions, that my punishment would be lesser than what is being proposed."

Brazeau and fellow senators Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin are facing motions that would suspend them without pay and benefits because of inappropriately claimed expenses.

Brazeau said Claude Carignan took him aside outside the Senate chamber, and offered him the deal.

Carignan responded by backing up what Brazeau said, although he said his intent was not how Brazeau described it.

"I spoke to him out of friendship," Carignan said, "in saying, 'Senator Brazeau, please suggest something.'" Carignan said he suggested Brazeau's penalty could be "lighter."

It was an attempt to help Brazeau, Carignan said. "I regret he perceived it as an attack."

In a scrum with reporters in the Senate foyer shortly after Brazeau's statement, Carignan said, "I said to Brazeau, 'You could propose amendments or apologize. You could do some things to help your case.' And that was all."

Carignan said he's not dropping the motion to suspend Brazeau without pay, but, "I'm open and it's something that we could perhaps improve."

In a later scrum, after the Senate had adjourned for the day, Carignan said in French he has always been open to "friendly amendments." He said he was trying to explain that to Brazeau because, he said, Brazeau doesn't seem to understand the rules of the Senate very well.

Asked in English if he would have accepted amendments from Brazeau, Carignan replied, "I don't think so."

Wallin lays out her defence

During the same debate Friday, Senator Pamela Wallin seized the opportunity to carefully lay out her defence before her Senate colleagues as they debated whether to suspend her.

She said "the majority [Conservatives in the Senate] want my head on a platter," and then went through the accusations against her, point by point.

When she met with the Senate internal economy committee in August about the private auditing firm Deloitte's audit of her expenses, Wallin said, she was not allowed to question the auditors, who were present, and her lawyer was not allowed to speak at all.

Senator Pamela Wallin addressed the Senate again Friday, asking her colleagues to follow due process and charging that "the majority [Conservatives] want my head on a platter." (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

She said Deloitte found no evidence of fraud in her expenses, and had a hard time figuring out what "Senate business" meant.

Wallin said the rules about Senate business are "very, very vague." When, for instance, she said, she made a speech in a small town, and no record appeared about it online or in a newspaper, Deloitte would disallow it, discounting it as Senate business, although she argues it was. 

She did check with "the powers that be" about whether she could fly to Toronto and stay overnight before proceeding to Saskatchewan, the province she represents, and received different answers. "It just depends who you asked and on what day," she said.

Deloitte found Wallin frequently flew to Toronto, where she owns a condo, and stayed a night or two nights before going to Saskatchewan, charging the Senate for the flight.

Senate rules allow only direct flights to and from a senator's home province, with no lengthy stopovers in-between.  Wallin has always said she needed to overnight in Toronto to avoid a late night arrival in Saskatchewan and an hours-long drive to her home from the airport.

She sometimes mixed Senate business and private business in one return trip, Wallin said, explaining she would split the costs, charging one leg to the Senate, and one (as an example) to a company whose board meeting she attended.

"I want to say here again that I have made mistakes. None were purposeful, and none designed to benefit me personally," she said.

Wallin invited the listening senators "to fast forward to 2015" after the next federal election. If she's suspended without a fair hearing, she said, and Harper were to be re-elected, he "wouldn't be keen to reinstate me or invite me back.

"So, what if Mr. Trudeau was elected?" she continued. "I doubt he'd want to bring former Conservative senators back," implying that even if she was exonerated, she'd have no chance of sitting in the Senate again.

Wallin tabled several documents in the Senate Friday, mostly emails or letters written by her lawyer. Included was one that complains about LeBreton and Harper's current chief of staff reneging on a deal Wallin says they struck to allow her to say she was "recusing" herself from Conservative caucus, rather than resigning.

The email, addressed to LeBreton and Ray Novak, from lawyer Terrence O'Sullivan, says, "I am unaccustomed to being deceived and I don't intend to start now."

O'Sullivan goes on to say he has an email chain about the deal and complains LeBreton broke it within 10 minutes of Wallin leaving caucus by telling a reporter Wallin had resigned.

Vote next week

The Conservative leadership in the Senate gave notice Friday that it will seek closure on the debate. A vote on that motion, which can be preceded by up to six hours of debate, won't come until Monday or Tuesday, likely pushing a vote on the suspensions to mid-week.

Another factor in the timetable is that by Thursday, most Conservative senators will be heading to Calgary for the Conservative national policy convention.

Senator Patrick Brazeau arrives at the Senate on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2013. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

The RCMP is investigating the expense claims of Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau, but none of the three has been charged.

Brazeau faces charges of sexual assault in a separate matter.

Thursday's session showed increasing signs of a split in the Conservative caucus over the motions from Carignan to suspend the three. Conservative Senator Don Plett said Thursday that the motions are premature, making it clear he will not support them.

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Conservative email denies C-Vote campaign database dead

The Conservative Party is reassuring its supporters that a new multi-million-dollar program designed to track voters and party donors is still alive, despite an internal memo earlier this week that reassured riding associations they could return to the old program. 

The email says the story reported by CBC News on Wednesday, that the party is scrapping a next-generation donor database program called C-Vote, is not true. CBC News also reported that the party was redeploying the older Constitutent Information Management System, or CIMS.

"While we have no intention of discussing campaign strategy with the CBC or any reporter, we will continue to have the best political technology in the next election as a result of our investments in CIMS and C-Vote," said the email, sent from an anonymous party account.

"As we have said, CIMS will be the primary tool we use in our ridings to fight and win elections, while C-Vote will continue to operate and to provide advanced voter tracking and targeting."

The email doesn't address the reported cost, which CBC News has confirmed is $7.1 million. The email was sent to a narrower group of supporters than the usual fundraising blasts.

Conservative Party spokesman Cory Hann, as well as other party officials, refused to respond to repeated requests on Wednesday. Hann didn't respond to an email asking about the latest message.

The memo sent Monday to riding presidents and MPs said CIMS would be redeployed across the country over the next few months.

"Due to strong demand from caucus, our ridings, and database volunteers we will be re-instituting CIMS across the country," Dave Forrestell, the party's acting executive director, said in the memo on Monday.

"To be clear, we will never again deploy C-Vote in our ridings."

"All data that was previously in CIMS or that has been entered into C-Vote will be available to you in CIMS."

The memo came a week and a half ahead of the party's biannual convention in Calgary.

Sources also say the party's national council wasn't aware C-Vote was about to be scrapped, and only found out through the memo.

CBC News has learned Forrestell is no longer the acting executive director of the party. After two months doing the job, Forrestell is leaving for another job. 

A source who requested anonymity said the departure was always planned to coincide with the party's convention, and pointed to a long-planned going-away party as proof.

That leaves the party's executive director position vacant.

The party is planning a "detailed information session" on voter tracking, run by its IT department, for the convention. The convention starts on Thursday. 

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Harper not swayed by senators' appeals

Prime Minister Stephen Harper says he will not be swayed by the extraordinary debate heard in the Senate this week as three embattled senators took turns fighting for their livelihood, after the Senate presented a motion to suspend them without pay over thousands of dollars claimed in ineligible expenses.

In an interview with Newstalk 1010 on Friday, Harper said the Senate doesn't have to wait to find out if the RCMP will lay criminal charges against former Conservative senators Patrick Brazeau, Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin in order to take disciplinary action against them.

"There is absolutely no doubt what these three senators did… these senators, in some cases, have collected literally up to six figures in ineligible expenses and did so willingly over a long period of time."

"What I would say and what Canadians would say is if you did that in your work, your boss would not wait for you to be convicted of a crime. Your boss would say that and that alone requires that some action be taken in terms of your job."

The prime minister urged the Senate to vote on the motion as soon as possible, accusing the Liberals of stalling the vote.

"This was a motion moved by the majority of Conservative senators and I think the Senate should at least vote on it. Right now, the Liberals are just trying to delay a vote. Let the Senate vote on it," Harper said.

To ensure that senators vote on the motion sooner rather than later, the Conservative leadership in the Senate gave notice on Friday that it will seek closure.

A vote on the motion to seek closure won't come until Monday or Tuesday, pushing the vote on suspensions until mid-week, just before the Conservatives gather for their annual party convention in Calgary on Thursday.

Harper's comments come on the heels of concerns expressed by Conservatives who do not support the motion, believing due process must take place before blunt action is taken.

The debate over the Senate motion revealed a rift among Harper's caucus with Senator Don Plett and Alberta MP Peter Goldring leading the charge against the motion this week​.

On Thursday, the two Conservatives publicly stated they do not support the Senate motion to have the three senators suspended without pay.

Plett, a powerful voice in the party, said suspending the three senators and stripping them of income would set a precedent allowing the Senate to suspend any senator who is seen to be "an irritant."

Goldring told reporters he is lobbying Conservative senators to reject the motion he deems unconstitutional and is even considering appealing to the Governor General.

Another Conservative senator, Don Meredith, said he supports a Liberal Senate motion to have the matter sent to a committee for further study.

The Conservative dissenters made their views known a day after Harper said, in question period on Wednesday, he "fully" supported the Senate motion to have the three former Conservative senators suspended and stripped of their pay.

The prime minister reiterated his position during a radio interview on Friday saying "I think that's what people expect… when people abuse a position of trust at this level and over this time period and this clearly, that there will be appropriate action taken that frankly removes them from the public payroll."

All three senators had the opportunity to defend themselves before the Senate this week.

Brazeau told the Senate on Friday afternoon that he was offered a "backroom deal" by Claude Carignan, the government leader in the Senate, earlier in the day. 

The Senate would go easier on him if he were to apologize to Canadians and take responsibility for his actions, Brazeau told the Senate.

Carignan did not deny Brazeau's statement, saying he spoke to him "out of friendship" and suggested the penalty could be "lighter."

Carignan said it was an attempt to help Brazeau. "I regret he perceived it as an attack."

Wallin also mounted a defence against the Senate motion on Friday, calling on all senators for due process, charging that the majority Conservative senators in the Senate want her "head on a platter."

The senator from Saskatchewan told the Senate on Wednesday she was the victim of media leaks orchestrated by two other Conservative senators to discredit her.

Duffy told the Senate on Tuesday there was a Conservative scheme to have him removed from the upper chamber unless he went along with a plan to repay his Senate expenses, although he believed he had followed the rules. 

The prime minister maintains he knew nothing about the $90,000 cheque Nigel Wright, his former chief of staff, gave to Duffy to repay his ineligible expenses.

On Friday, Harper told the Toronto radio station "I think I had every right to know. I should have been told. I think I clearly should have been consulted, I was not."

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Trudeau challenges Harper to testify under oath

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is renewing his call for Prime Minister Stephen Harper to testify under oath, about what he knew and when he knew it, in the Senate expenses scandal.

In an interview with CBC Radio's The House, Trudeau said Parliament is "getting bogged down with scandal and conflict." 

"It's really frustrating to see the level of mistrust and disgust that Canadians are having towards Parliament, towards the prime minister right now. It's time the prime minister showed some leadership and actually came clean on everything he knew, and the only way we're going to be able to do that, unfortunately, is if everybody testifies under oath."

Trudeau earlier this week said Harper should testify under oath. Harper has not responded. 

The Liberal Leader offered no specifics about what kind of probe he's advocating. "The RCMP's already investigating what's gone on in the Wright-Duffy affairs. They're trying to get to the bottom of this issue. There are lots of different ways of getting to testimony under oath. There are inquiries, there are various ways of doing it," Trudeau said.

Trudeau's challenge to Harper followed new claims by Senator Patrick Brazeau that he'd been offered "a back-room deal."

Brazeau said Claude Carignan, the government leader in the Senate, approached him Friday morning.

Senator Patrick Brazeau, above, claims he was offered a "back-room deal" by the government leader in the Senate, Claude Carignan. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

​"And the back-room deal was that if I stood in [the Senate]

, apologized to Canadians and took responsibility for my actions, that my punishment would be lesser than what is being proposed," Brazeau said. 

Carignan told reporters his remarks had been misinterpreted by Brazeau.

Asked what he thought of Brazeau's accusation and Carignan's denial, Trudeau said, "I don't want to get into the 'he said, she said.'"

What is apparent is the Conservatives are doing anything they can to try to minimize the damage that has been caused by this entire affair to their reputation, to their credibility, to their capacity to actually address the many challenges Canadians are facing," he added. 

The Senate is expected to vote next week on a Conservative motion to suspend Brazeau and fellow Senators Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin without pay or benefits — a proposal the Liberals have said they won't support without amendments.

"We're pushing for openness and transparency and an opportunity to hear from these three Senators at committee. We have Mr. Harper deciding that he's going to dump all the responsibility on the three of them and try to create a serious penalty here that, to my mind, needs to be at least reasonably discussed before we enact something that's going to create precedents," said Trudeau.

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Senate to consider changing suspension motion

Breaking

Government Senate leader to seek consensus before considering changes

CBC News Posted: Oct 27, 2013 9:41 AM ET Last Updated: Oct 27, 2013 9:41 AM ET

Wallin's lawyer responds 7:20

Wallin's lawyer responds 7:20

Tory MP opposes Senate suspension motion 7:46

Tory MP opposes Senate suspension motion 7:46

Senators Suspending Senators - Oct 25, 2013 22:00

Senators Suspending Senators - Oct 25, 2013 22:00

The leader of the government in the Senate, Claude Carignon, says he is open to amendments to a motion that, as it currently reads, would suspend three Conservative Senators without pay or benefits for two years over allegations of wrongdoing with their expense claims.

"Our colleagues at Radio-Canada did an interview and sat down to chat with him and asked him some very pointed questions," CBC's Hannah Thibedeau said on Sunday.

"What he did say is that, yes, there is a potential to change those sanctions," which would be levelled against Senators Pamela Wallin, Mike Duffy and Patrick Brazeau if the motion is approved.

The Conservative caucus will meet behind closed doors on Monday morning to consider a possible change to the way the motion is worded. Carignon said there would have to be a consensus before any new motion is crafted.

More to come

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The House

• Trudeau challenges Harper to testify under oath Oct. 25, 2013 11:13 PM This week on a special edition of The House, Evan Solomon takes a closer look at the unfolding Senate controversy with Liberal Party leader Justin Trudeau, Conservative Senator, and former leader of the government in the Senate, Marjory LeBreton, as well as fellow Conservative Senator, and former party president, Don Plett.

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Patrick Brazeau says he was offered 'backroom deal'

In a dramatic moment during a Senate debate over his suspension without pay, Senator Patrick Brazeau said he was offered what he called a "backroom deal" by the government leader of the Senate Friday morning.

"The deal was," said Brazeau, "that if I stood in this chamber, apologized to Canadians and took responsibility for my actions, that my punishment would be lesser than what is being proposed."

Brazeau and fellow senators Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin are facing motions that would suspend them without pay and benefits because of inappropriately claimed expenses.

Brazeau said Claude Carignan took him aside outside the Senate chamber, and offered him the deal.

Carignan responded by backing up what Brazeau said, although he said his intent was not how Brazeau described it.

"I spoke to him out of friendship," Carignan said, "in saying, 'Senator Brazeau, please suggest something.'" Carignan said he suggested Brazeau's penalty could be "lighter."

It was an attempt to help Brazeau, Carignan said. "I regret he perceived it as an attack."

In a scrum with reporters in the Senate foyer shortly after Brazeau's statement, Carignan said, "I said to Brazeau, 'You could propose amendments or apologize. You could do some things to help your case.' And that was all."

Carignan said he's not dropping the motion to suspend Brazeau without pay, but, "I'm open and it's something that we could perhaps improve."

In a later scrum, after the Senate had adjourned for the day, Carignan said in French he has always been open to "friendly amendments." He said he was trying to explain that to Brazeau because, he said, Brazeau doesn't seem to understand the rules of the Senate very well.

Asked in English if he would have accepted amendments from Brazeau, Carignan replied, "I don't think so."

Wallin lays out her defence

During the same debate Friday, Senator Pamela Wallin seized the opportunity to carefully lay out her defence before her Senate colleagues as they debated whether to suspend her.

She said "the majority [Conservatives in the Senate] want my head on a platter," and then went through the accusations against her, point by point.

When she met with the Senate internal economy committee in August about the private auditing firm Deloitte's audit of her expenses, Wallin said, she was not allowed to question the auditors, who were present, and her lawyer was not allowed to speak at all.

Senator Pamela Wallin addressed the Senate again Friday, asking her colleagues to follow due process and charging that "the majority [Conservatives] want my head on a platter." (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

She said Deloitte found no evidence of fraud in her expenses, and had a hard time figuring out what "Senate business" meant.

Wallin said the rules about Senate business are "very, very vague." When, for instance, she said, she made a speech in a small town, and no record appeared about it online or in a newspaper, Deloitte would disallow it, discounting it as Senate business, although she argues it was. 

She did check with "the powers that be" about whether she could fly to Toronto and stay overnight before proceeding to Saskatchewan, the province she represents, and received different answers. "It just depends who you asked and on what day," she said.

Deloitte found Wallin frequently flew to Toronto, where she owns a condo, and stayed a night or two nights before going to Saskatchewan, charging the Senate for the flight.

Senate rules allow only direct flights to and from a senator's home province, with no lengthy stopovers in-between.  Wallin has always said she needed to overnight in Toronto to avoid a late night arrival in Saskatchewan and an hours-long drive to her home from the airport.

She sometimes mixed Senate business and private business in one return trip, Wallin said, explaining she would split the costs, charging one leg to the Senate, and one (as an example) to a company whose board meeting she attended.

"I want to say here again that I have made mistakes. None were purposeful, and none designed to benefit me personally," she said.

Wallin invited the listening senators "to fast forward to 2015" after the next federal election. If she's suspended without a fair hearing, she said, and Harper were to be re-elected, he "wouldn't be keen to reinstate me or invite me back.

"So, what if Mr. Trudeau was elected?" she continued. "I doubt he'd want to bring former Conservative senators back," implying that even if she was exonerated, she'd have no chance of sitting in the Senate again.

Wallin tabled several documents in the Senate Friday, mostly emails or letters written by her lawyer. Included was one that complains about LeBreton and Harper's current chief of staff reneging on a deal Wallin says they struck to allow her to say she was "recusing" herself from Conservative caucus, rather than resigning.

The email, addressed to LeBreton and Ray Novak, from lawyer Terrence O'Sullivan, says, "I am unaccustomed to being deceived and I don't intend to start now."

O'Sullivan goes on to say he has an email chain about the deal and complains LeBreton broke it within 10 minutes of Wallin leaving caucus by telling a reporter Wallin had resigned.

Vote next week

The Conservative leadership in the Senate gave notice Friday that it will seek closure on the debate. A vote on that motion, which can be preceded by up to six hours of debate, won't come until Monday or Tuesday, likely pushing a vote on the suspensions to mid-week.

Another factor in the timetable is that by Thursday, most Conservative senators will be heading to Calgary for the Conservative national policy convention.

Senator Patrick Brazeau arrives at the Senate on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Thursday, Oct. 24, 2013. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

The RCMP is investigating the expense claims of Duffy, Wallin and Brazeau, but none of the three has been charged.

Brazeau faces charges of sexual assault in a separate matter.

Thursday's session showed increasing signs of a split in the Conservative caucus over the motions from Carignan to suspend the three. Conservative Senator Don Plett said Thursday that the motions are premature, making it clear he will not support them.

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