Not to be trusted

David Akin follows up on the Alan Riddell case, pointing out that the Cons conceded in court the existence of an agreement that they vehemently denied publicly during the campaign:

I remember clear as if it was yesterday standing in a scrum with Stephen Harper on Dec. 4, 2005 -- in the middle of the election campaign Harper would eventually win -- asking him if the party had agreed to pay Riddell off as part of a backroom deal -- a confidential agreement -- to clear the way for Riddell.
"In fact there is no agreement and he hasn't been paid anything," Harper told reporters on Dec. 4, 2005.

"The party does not have an agreement to pay Mr. Riddell these expenses, and Mr. Riddell has not been paid anything to date," Harper told us said when asked again on the same day...

Among those who negotiated directly with Riddell or his representatives in late 2005 were Ian Brodie, who was then and is now Harper's Chief of Staff; Mike Donison, then and now the executive director of the Conservative Party; and Don Plett, who was, then and now, the president of party. Brodie and Donison had, like Harper, rejected the idea that there was any backroom deal with Riddell when asked about this in late 2005.

What's even more interesting in a look at the decision is that the Cons manage to have twisted their public denials that any agreement existed into an attempt to claim they gave notice to Riddell that they were repudiating the agreement (treating their own responsibilities as being done with due to an alleged breach by Riddell). But this new effort at spin met with about as much success as the Cons' attempt to deny the agreement in the first place. From para. 79 of the judgment:

The C.P.C.'s position is that its statements made to the news media following its becoming aware of Mr. Riddell's press releases and communications to third parties to the agreement that "there is no agreement to pay Alan Riddell ..." should be interpreted as an act of repudiation. I cannot and do not accept this argument as reasonable in light of the facts.

It's significant enough that so much of Harper's inner circle was flat-out lying to the public during the course of the campaign - but it shows the Cons' sheer contempt for reality that after admitting the lie to the court, they'd then try to read those words as meaning the exact opposite of what they said in an effort to avoid being held to their own contract.

Fortunately, Power J. didn't see fit to play along. And in light of yet another admitted incident of lying to the public by the Cons' inner circle, there's no reason at all for anybody within that group to be seen as remotely credible in the future.