The head of the RCMP and the former public safety minister continued to insist on Monday that there was no political interference in a police investigation into the Nova Scotia mass shooting of April 2020.
The House of Commons committee on public safety called back Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair and RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki to drill down into the details of a tense conference call between Lucki and senior staff in Nova Scotia that was held in the days after the shooting.
Partial recordings and transcripts of the call released by the Mass Casualty Commission earlier this month have revived allegations of political pressure by Blair’s office on Lucki and the RCMP to release details about the firearms used.
The Conservatives have called on Blair to resign, and Tory members on the committee grilled the minister on Monday about whether he or his staff had requested the information to be released, which Blair denied.
“It wasn’t something I had requested or required of her,” he said, adding he never directed police to release information pertaining to any investigation while he was public safety minister.
At issue was a reference Lucki made during the April 28, 2020, call to a “request” she said she received from a minister’s office, though she did not specify which minister or the exact nature of the request.
Lucki explained to the committee that the request was actually a clarification from Blair’s then-chief of staff about whether or not basic information about the firearms would be made public.
Lucki said it would be, based on guidance from communications staff, only to become frustrated when Nova Scotia RCMP did not do so.
That ask from Blair’s office was one of several she said she received in the days after the shooting from the media and politicians in Nova Scotia and Ottawa about when certain information about the shooting would be released and when.
“We’re making this all about the firearms, but it wasn’t just about the firearms,” she said.
Lucki further explained that her frustration on the 2020 call was due to a communication breakdown that led her to believe details about the firearms, as well as a chronology of the events during the shooting, would be released earlier than they were.
She told the committee her reference during the call about an apology to the minister was actually delivered to Blair’s office, not Blair himself — but insisted it was not because she had broken any kind of promise regarding the firearms that was tied to impending gun control legislation.
“If I say to you, Mr. Lloyd, that I’m going to give you information tomorrow by 4 o’clock, I’m expecting to have the information by tomorrow at 4 o’clock,” she explained to Conservative MP Dane Lloyd.
“If I don’t get you the information by 4 o’clock, I’m going to phone you up and say, ‘You know what? I’m sorry, I didn’t get you the information.'”
Blair also said he never received a direct apology from Lucki and that one wouldn’t be necessary.
He also refused to speculate on conversations between his senior staff, Lucki and the RCMP commissioner’s senior staff that he wasn’t directly involved in, distancing himself from any conversations about what type of information would be released about the mass shooting.
Lucki dismissed Conservative MP Raquel Denko’s accusations that the combined references in the call to a “request,” an apology and the impending legislation painted a picture of political interference.
“I appreciate your perception, but your perception is incorrect,” Lucki responded.
Asked later about why she brought up the legislation at all, she said she simply wanted to provide the “full context” of what was taking place at the time.
“We can’t be naive about what’s going on around us,” she said.
Notes taken during the conference call by Nova Scotia RCMP commanders and communications staff were what first led to allegations of political interference, which Blair and Lucki have repeatedly denied.
— with files from Global’s Brian Hill and the Canadian Press
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