Tory minister's office hired niece of Carson’s girlfriend in 2008

Tory minister's office hired niece of Carson’s girlfriend in 2008

In 2008, the office of Conservative cabinet minister Gary Lunn hired a relative of Bruce Carson’s then-girlfriend, a former prostitute who was convicted in the United States of money laundering, The Globe and Mail has learned.

Though she had no particular relevant experience or Conservative Party background, Sarifa Khan worked from March to September of 2008 as a ministerial staffer in Mr. Lunn’s office, a job usually coveted by young staffers to Tory MPs.

... After pleading guilty to money laundering and being deported to Canada, Barbara Lynn Khan started dating Mr. Carson in 2006, when he was an adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and purchased a condominium with him after he left the PMO in 2009.

Barbara Lynn’s niece, Sarifa Khan, was in her early 20s when she was hired by Mr. Lunn, then the Natural Resources Minister, for a job with the title of special assistant, parliamentary affairs and a salary of at least $53,700.

As the Prime Minister’s point man on the environment and energy, Mr. Carson frequently worked with Mr. Lunn during his time as Natural Resources Minister, and the two men had a friendly relationship. But Louise Girouard, Mr. Lunn’s chief of staff at the time, said that neither she nor Mr. Lunn spoke to Mr. Carson about hiring his girlfriend’s niece and that Mr. Carson wasn’t involved.

Bruce Carson was Harper's top adviser on Afghanistan

Carson was ‘Harper’s guy’ on Afghan file

Bruce Carson was the Prime Minister’s point man on Canada’s mission in Afghanistan and was provided sensitive information about the military mission despite his criminal record, the Star has learned.

Stephen Harper now says he never would have hired Carson had he known all the details of his criminal past.

But starting in 2007, Carson was a regular participant in daily telephone briefings on Afghanistan involving senior officials from departments such as foreign affairs, defence, RCMP, justice and corrections.

“It was evident to all the departments that he was the main player, Harper’s point man on the file,” said one source familiar with the briefings.

“He was given the most sensitive file to work on ... it’s not like he was working in the mailroom.”

While Harper has a national security adviser, it was left to Carson, chief policy analyst, to stickhandle the Afghan file on a daily basis. His focus was usually on how the mission was being communicated here in Canada rather than on developments in the field, the source said.

Harper on ex-PMO adviser’s rap sheet: ‘I wouldn’t have hired him’

Ex-Harper adviser disclosed entire criminal record to PMO: lawyer

Bruce Carson was convicted on five counts of fraud, three more than previously known, and received court-ordered psychiatric treatment before becoming one of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's closest advisers.

And his lawyer told The Canadian Press that Mr. Carson disclosed his entire criminal record during a security check that was required to become a senior staffer in the Prime Minister's Office.

The latest revelations raise new questions about Mr. Harper's judgment in hiring Mr. Carson as his chief policy analyst and troubleshooter – roles Mr. Carson played until leaving the PMO in 2008. ...

During Mr. Carson's stint at the PMO, it was publicly known that he had been jailed and disbarred by the Law Society of Upper Canada in the early 1980s for two counts of defrauding clients.

But court documents uncovered by The Canadian Press show he had another run-in with the law in 1990, while he was working as a researcher for the Library of Parliament.

He was charged with defrauding a Budget Car and Truck Rental of a 1989 Toyota vehicle. He was also charged with defrauding the Bank of Montreal and the Toronto-Dominion Bank of sums exceeding $1,000 each.

In June 1990, Mr. Carson pleaded guilty to all three counts and received a suspended sentence and 24 months probation on condition that he “continue treatment at the R.O.H. (Royal Ottawa Hospital)” and make restitution of $4,000 within 23 months to the car rental company. ...

Since turning over the lobbying allegations to the RCMP, the PMO has severed all ties with Carson, who had been serving as head of the federally-funded Canada School of Energy and the Environment in Calgary since leaving the PMO. He has taken a leave of absence from that job.

Privately, Mr. Carson's friends are upset that Mr. Harper has ostracized his long-time adviser, without waiting for the results of the police investigation, and has refused to frankly discuss what he knew about Mr. Carson's past and why he felt Mr. Carson deserved a second chance. ...

In 1993, documents show Mr. Carson declared bankruptcy, with a debt of $103,000. As recently as 2002 — just before he went to work as then-opposition leader Harper's director of policy and research — he was in debt to the tune of $369,000 and was being hounded by creditors. In the latter case, Mr. Carson has told The Canadian Press that he arranged to pay back his creditors over a period of time. ...

Mr. Carson's financial woes were well known among his former colleagues at the Library of Parliament's research branch. Five former colleagues, who spoke separately to The Canadian Press on condition of anonymity, said he sought to borrow money repeatedly.

In one instance recalled by several former co-workers, Mr. Carson told a colleague he wanted to take his kids on a trip but was having financial difficulties due to his divorce. The colleague was persuaded to allow Mr. Carson to use his credit card number as surety for renting a car.

Mr. Carson ran up several thousand worth of charges on the number, maxing out his colleague's card.

Harper on ex-PMO adviser’s rap sheet: ‘I wouldn’t have hired him’

Stephen Harper says he wouldn’t have installed former adviser Bruce Carson in his Prime Minister’s Office if he had been aware of his past.

The Conservative Leader says he was never told of Mr. Carson’s full criminal record.

... The Privy Council Office said it cannot discuss what Mr. Carson revealed when he applied for the job, insisting the Privacy Act prevents such disclosure.

PCO said it is the RCMP that conducts the checks, but a spokesman for the RCMP, Sergeant Julie Gagnon, said that while the RCMP does the checks, it’s the PCO that manages the process, and referred all questions back there.

I'm a bit mystified about this Canada School for the Energy and the Environment that Carson runs (Carson is now on a leave of absence, he hasn't been fired). It appears to be a federally-funded institution that defends Canada's lack of a climate-change strategy, which fits in with Carson's earlier responsibilities.

More on Bruce Carson, Harper's former acting chief of staff

Paula Simons, writing in the Edmonton Journal:

Let's start with two questions.

How did Bruce Carson, 66, come to be appointed as the executive director of the Canada School of Energy and Environment, a federally-funded think-tank that links academics from the University of Alberta, the University of Calgary and the University of Lethbridge?

How did Carson come to be named, only this January, to the Alberta government's "expert panel," which is supposed to create a world-class environmental monitoring system for Alberta's oilsands?

Carson, after all, was sentenced to 18 months in jail in the 1980s for theft and fraud in relation to the misappropriation of funds from both his law firm and his clients. (The think-tank website boasts of Carson's two legal degrees, without mentioning that he was disbarred by the Upper Canada Law Society in 1980.) More to the point, perhaps, Carson is a former senior policy adviser to Stephen Harper, and a federal Conservative campaign strategist who has been instrumental in structuring the federal government's pro-oilsands PR strategy, and in serving as an adviser to CAPP, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

He was appointed to the federally created, federally-funded think-tank in 2008 while he was actually working in Harper's office, and he continued to do campaign strategy work and policy consultation for the Conservative party and the Harper government even after he was named the school's executive director. It's a degree of political consanguinity that undermines the credibility and academic integrity of the think-tank, which is supposed to be positioning Alberta as a world leader in "green" energy development.

Then, this January, Rob Renner, Alberta's environment minister, named Carson as one of the 12 experts hand-picked to come up with a way to monitor environmental impacts of the oilsands. How a person convicted of theft and fraud, who was also advising CAPP and the federal government on how to put a positive "spin" on oilsands development, was to add credibility to Alberta's environmental monitoring practices isn't clear.

... Here's the third question. Why did it take the words "escort" and "nude photos" to get people--including me--asking the first two questions?

Carson penned lobbying report, then found loophole

“I really don’t want the lobbying commissioner sort of going crazy over my involvement in this,” Carson told [APTN] in a series of interviews prior to the RCMP being called in. “This would be like one-tenth of 1 per cent of my time, so we’re all right.”

Despite setting up meetings for the firm with Indian Affairs Minister John Duncan’s office and plans to employ Environment Minister Peter Kent in his business plan, the Harper confidant maintained he would be shielded from any lobbying probe under a well-known loophole in the federal laws, according to APTN.

A chink in the Harper government’s flagship accountability armour allows former government officials to flog their services or products on Parliament Hill, despite the five-year ban, for those whose lobbying works out to less than 20 per cent of their total workload.

PM’s ex-adviser Carson has chequered past

Bruce Carson went bankrupt, with thousands of dollars of debt, before becoming one of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s closest advisers.

Documents obtained by The Canadian Press show Mr. Carson declared bankruptcy in 1993, then was hounded by creditors again in 2002 – shortly before going to work as then-opposition leader Harper’s director of policy and research.

He declared a debt of $103,359 in the 1990s, and $369,000 nine years ago, the records show. No further information is given in the bankruptcy documents. ...

Minutes from a July 16, 1981, meeting of the society's discipline committee shed light on why Carson was disbarred.

“He had forged the signature of the president of a corporation and misappropriated over $15,000 belonging to the corporation for which he acted,” the document says.

“[He] forged the signature of a client from whom he misappropriated over $4,000; and misappropriated $4,900 belonging to another client.”

Mr. Carson reinvented himself as a constitutional expert and became a political insider, working under Progressive Conservative prime ministers Joe Clark and Brian Mulroney, as well as Ontario Premier Mike Harris, before going to work for Harper when he became leader of the opposition.

Mr. Carson remained with Harper after the Conservatives won the 2006 election. Around political Ottawa, he was known as “the Mechanic” for his ability to fix tricky situations.

Senate Majority Leader Marjory LeBreton underscored Mr. Carson's worth to Mr. Harper's office during a November, 2006 Senate debate, calling him “a valued employee of the Prime Minister's Office.”

Harper asks RCMP to investigate former top advisor

Harper asks RCMP to investigate his former top adviser

Stephen Harper has asked the RCMP to investigate the activities of one of his former aides who allegedly used his position to offer access to the Prime Minister and his staff.

Bruce Carson, who is listed as the executive director of the Canada School of Energy and Environment and the vice-chair of the Energy Policy Institute of Canada, was once one of Mr. Harper’s closest advisers.

The Prime Minister’s Office asked the Mounties to look into allegations of influence-peddling this week as the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) was preparing an investigative report about Mr. Carson.

... The APTN has been looking into the activities of Mr. Carson and planned to air a segment revealing what it had learned on March 25 on a show called APTN Investigates. The date of the broadcast has not been changed despite the fact that the police are now involved. The network says it has obtained correspondence to show that Mr. Carson lobbied Indian Affairs and Indian Affairs Minister John Duncan’s office on behalf of an Ottawa-based water company. The water company was apparently attempting to land contracts to sell water-filtration systems to native reserves with severe water-quality problems.

The Ottawa Citizen:

A former top adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper was lobbying the Indian Affairs Department earlier this year for a water filtration company involved in a multi-million dollar deal in which his fiancée, a former upscale call girl from Ottawa, stood to gain a lucrative commission.

... Indian Affairs officials confirmed Thursday that Carson, who is not registered as a lobbyist, met with John Duncan’s ministerial staff on Jan. 11. He had left the PMO in February 2009.

Paul Wells describes Carson as one of Harper's most trusted and well-liked advisors, and links to a 2008 profile of Carson.

Officially Harper's legislative assistant, his true stature is better reflected by the fact that he fills in as chief of staff when Ian Brodie is away from Ottawa. (At the time this article was being written, with Brodie on vacation, Carson was running the shop.) "He's Harper's grey-haired sage," according to one veteran Conservative strategist. "The PM trusts him implicitly." Other insiders confirm that Carson's long experience and extensive personal contacts with old-school Tories are regarded as invaluable. But it's not his institutional memory or seasoned perspective that have most enhanced Carson's reputation--it's his ability to take on tough files that demand concentrated work. "Bruce is our mechanic," says a Harper confidant. "He can fix anything."

Well, maybe not anything. Back in 2006, Carson was loaned to then environment minister Ron Ambrose when her handling of the government's high-profile climate change strategy was spinning out of control. The intervention wasn't enough to save Ambrose, who was later shuffled out of Environment to sink from sight as intergovernmental affairs minister. But Carson wasn't blamed. Established on the file, he stuck with it to play a key behind-the-scenes role as an architect of Environment Minister John Baird's bid last spring to succeed where Ambrose had stumbled in crafting a plausible global warming strategy.

In that role, Carson appeared on the radar screens of powerful industry lobbyists, particularly in the oil and gas sector, who are worried about how any emissions regulations could hit their bottom lines. An Ottawa consultant with Tory credentials sees Carson brokering among cabinet ministers who represent sometimes conflicting interests on the climate change issue. "In virtually all of the negotiations among [Industry Minister] Jim Prentice, [Natural Resources Minister] Gary Lunn, and Baird," said the consultant, "Bruce has been at the table."

Carson's close working relationship with Prentice, the influential chairman of the cabinet's operations committee, is crucial. When Prentice was Indian affairs minister prior to last summer's cabinet shuffle, Carson became the key behind-the-scenes architect of a new system for settling what are called "specific" native land claims. While Indian Affairs has never cracked the top echelon of Harper priorities, the portfolio is seen as strategically key. Having taken the controversial step of scrapping Liberal prime minister Paul Martin's multi-billion-dollar Kelowna accord, the Conservatives decided they needed at least one significant accomplishment in their relationship with native leaders to hang in the window. Carson delivered it.

Remarkably, Carson has played his mechanic's role on files like climate change and land claims without giving up day-to-day prominence in Harper's Parliament Hill operation. Along with Keith Beardsley, in charge of "issues management" in the PMO, Carson runs question period preparation. Not bad for a guy who not long ago looked like a relic from a previous Tory era.

He's the chair of the Federal-Provincial-Oil and Gas Industry Working Group on Climate Change.