WINNIPEG – Manitoba’s Opposition Progressive Conservatives have demanded an inquiry into former immigration minister Christine Melnick, saying she lied to a legislature committee when she denied being involved in a staged immigration debate.
A report from the provincial ombudsman this week said Melnick has admitted to being behind the plan. That contradicts what Melnick told a legislature committee in May 2012.
“This is perjury. This is lying,” Tory Leader Brian Pallister said Friday.
“(The premier) has taken no action whatsoever — zero action — as a consequence of knowing that a member of his caucus lied under oath before a committee of this legislature.”
Pallister also called on Premier Greg Selinger to drop Melnick from the NDP caucus. She was one of three cabinet ministers demoted to the backbenches earlier this year, but continues to sit in caucus for the Riel constituency in south Winnipeg.
Selinger was not immediately available to comment.
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Under the province’s Legislative Assembly Act, the legislature can conduct an inquiry into alleged false evidence given to a committee, among other offences, and can order imprisonment for anyone found guilty.
The controversy stems from April 19, 2012, when Melnick scheduled a legislature debate on a resolution criticizing the federal government’s plan to take over some immigration programs run by the province.
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The previous day, assistant deputy minister Ben Rempel had issued an email to government-funded immigrant service agencies telling them of the event and saying that people should feel free to come —even if it meant taking the afternoon off work.
The Tory Opposition immediately accused the government of politicizing the civil service to orchestrate a show of support for the government. It also said government-funded agencies and immigrants would feel pressured to obey the request to attend.
The Opposition repeatedly asked Melnick and Selinger whether a politician had told Rempel to send the email. When Melnick appeared before a budget estimates committee on May 30 of last year, she denied being behind the plan.
“Who directed … Ben Rempel, then, to send the email?” asked Mavis Tallieu, the Tory immigration critic at the time.
“I’m not sure this really relates to the estimates process, and we don’t know. There was no direction to send this email,” Melnick responded, according to legislature Hansard.
Melnick also said in a media interview at the time that she was not behind the email.
Selinger has so far refused to answer specific questions about the ombudsman’s findings regarding Melnick. He said Thursday that the government was still reviewing the report and would accept its recommendations for new guidelines to prevent the appearance of partisanship in the civil service.
Melnick has refused to comment. Her office referred questions Friday to the NDP cabinet’s press secretaries.
Pallister said the premier owes the public an explanation as to when he discovered Melnick had been untruthful and why no one in government set the record straight.
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