When Pierre Trudeau's architect friend got a plum government job
Arthur Erickson wasn't on the shortlist, but snagged the contract for a new embassy in 1982
Vancouver architect Arthur Erickson had a high-profile career, designing B.C.'s Simon Fraser University and Toronto's Roy Thomson Hall, among many other buildings.
And in the spring of 1982, the Canadian government under Pierre Trudeau awarded him another notable commission, for Canada's new embassy building in Washington, D.C.
In the view of the Opposition, the appointment amounted to "blatant patronage," as The National reported on May 11, 1982.
"The Conservatives called the selection process a 'charade,'" said reporter Jason Moscovitz. "They wanted answers."
'Doomed in advance'
"Will [Trudeau] resign if it is found that he did promise this job to his friend, and then set up a fraudulent process ... that was already doomed in advance?" asked PC MP John Crosbie in the House that day.
According to the report, Trudeau had admitted earlier that Cabinet ignored the advice of a selection committee when it picked Erickson.
Crosbie's fellow PC MP (and future governor general) Ray Hnatyshyn piled on.
"The prime minister is so obviously embarrassed about this matter," he said. "He's been caught with his pants down."
The Tories wanted an independent investigation into the selection of Erickson. As the CBC's The Journal would explain later that night, Erickson hadn't even been one of the four finalists on the committee's shortlist.
But Trudeau didn't view the selection committee's work as the final word.
"I did not feel that the government had to choose the one who was at the top of the list," said Trudeau.
'Great prestige'
At his Vancouver office, Erickson denied a report in the Globe and Mail that claimed he was given the job two years earlier, before the selection committee was even appointed.
"Supposedly it went through the usual sources and usual processes, and I didn't seem to make the [final list]," he told the CBC's Barbara Frum. "I guess the Cabinet ... felt that I should have."
He said there had never been any understanding between himself and the prime minister that he would get the embassy job. But he did admit to wanting the commission.
"I had, of course, been pursuing this project through External Affairs and Public Works," he told Frum. "I had let them know that I was very anxious to get it because this is a project of great prestige and great challenge."
According to the Globe and Mail, the results of a 2002 survey in the American magazine Forbes named Erickson's eventual design as one of the "10 ugliest buildings in the world."
