OTTAWA – Even Mike Duffy’s own admission that he already owned a house in Ottawa didn’t stop Senate finance officials from approving his out-of-town living expenses, court heard Monday.
In a May 2011 memo, two-and-a-half years after he was appointed to represent Prince Edward Island in the Senate, Duffy told his financial official France Legace that he’d owned his Kanata, Ont. home for seven years.
His lawyer, Donald Bayne, used the memo in his cross-examination of former top finance official Nicole Proulx to suggest there were no clear rules for Duffy or other senators about what they could claim in living expenses.
“Senator Duffy never tried to hide the fact that he’d been living in Ottawa. He hadn’t had to move on his appointment,” Bayne said.
For four years, Duffy claimed living expenses for his “secondary” home in the Nation’s Capital, an annual fund for senators whose “primary residence” is 100 km away.
In total, Duffy claimed some $82,000 in living and travel expenses, court has heard.
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“There’s no criteria how long they have to have (the secondary residence), so if the primary residence is in the province (of their appointment), and they travel and incur cost, they would be eligible,” Proulx said.
“This would not necessarily have been a trigger.”
Bayne used another high-profile senator as an example that other senators who lived in Ottawa claimed expenses after appointment.
Numerous times Monday morning, Bayne brought up Senator Carolyn Stewart Olsen, former communications director for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who represents New Brunswick. According to public finance records available only as of September 2010, Stewart Olsen claimed just over $11,500 before she sold her house in 2011.
Stewart Olsen was also on the Senate committee that changed a report into Duffy’s expense claims after he agreed to pay back the $90,000 in expenses with interest.
It was later revealed that money came from Nigel Wright, the prime minister’s former chief of staff, and that Stewart Olsen worked closely with the PMO.
“You don’t say, hold on madame Senator Stewart Olsen or Senator Duffy, that how many days a year do you spend at your primary residence?” Bayne asked.
“No we don’t. This is not finance’s responsibility,” Proulx said.
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Earlier Monday, Bayne ran through several internal audits of the Senate which found lack of monitoring and financial oversight at the Senate.
In 2013, a Deloitte report said it could not come to a conclusion about Duffy’s living expenses because there were no criteria for primary or secondary residences.
“I agree that there were no definitions or no criteria to establish primary residence at that time,” Proulx said.
But she disputed the characterization that every claim would be rubber-stamped.
– with files from the Canadian Press
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