Recording of RCMP meeting that sparked political interference allegations released
Commissioner Brenda Lucki says request to release gun info came from office of public safety minister
The RCMP has finally released a recording of a controversial phone meeting in which the head of the RCMP dresses down staff in Nova Scotia for communications following the mass killings in the province.
The meeting, held days after the mass shootings, has been at the centre of accusations that the Prime Minister's Office and then public safety minister Bill Blair interfered politically with RCMP operations in order to benefit the Liberal government's pending gun legislation.
Four Nova Scotia RCMP staff members have testified at the Mass Casualty Commission that RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki reprimanded staff during the meeting on April 28, 2020, for not including information at a news conference earlier that day about the makes and models of the guns that were used in the killings of April 18 and 19 that year. They have all said publicly they believe political interference was a factor.
While the controversy over the comments has brewed for months, it wasn't until September that word of a possible recording emerged at the public proceedings. The recording, made by Dan Brien, director of media relations with the RCMP, was believed to have been deleted from his phone.
But it was recently recovered and released publicly Thursday by the commission.
Request came from minister's office
Lucki says in the recording, "it was a request that I got from the minister's office" and that she told the minister the information would be released, and then it wasn't.
LISTEN | Excerpts from RCMP commissioner's conversation with staff
Lucki has previously said that Blair never directed or ordered her to disclose the makes and models of the guns.
"Does anybody realize what's going on in the world of handguns and guns right now?" Lucki says during the meeting. "The fact that they're in the middle of trying to get a legislation going, the fact that that legislation is supposed to actually help police and the fact that the very little information I asked to be put in speaking notes at around 11:30 this morning ... could not be accommodated?
"So does anybody wonder why I feel frustrated, like I'm not being heard, which makes me feel disrespected?... Or is it just — am I being over-sensitive?"
She goes on to say she feels "bad" for having the conversation because she doesn't want to make the other staff feel bad.
"But … it's disheartening for me to try to manage our RCMP, which is bigger than Nova Scotia, and trying to at least give the prime minister a bit of information before he hears it on the news."
Lucki says she expected the line about the guns to be included as "part of the narrative" at the news conference, but the issue only came up during reporters' questions.
"It was only by fluke. Had the question not been asked, nothing about the guns would have been mentioned."
Apology to prime minister
Lucki also says she was promised a chronology of events during the mass killings as well as a map for the minister and prime minister, but didn't receive it on time.
"I have apologized to the minister, I'm waiting for the prime minister to call me so I can apologize," she says.
"I already have a request sitting in my phone that the minister wants to speak with me, and I know exactly what it's gonna be about. And ... there's not much I can say except that, once again, I dropped the ball. So that's gonna be the fourth time I'm gonna say that to him."
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has said the government did not put any "undue" pressure on the RCMP.
Timing of recording's release unhelpful
In a statement Thursday, the RCMP said senior management was made aware of the recording in June, and the commission was informed promptly. The statement said the RCMP is now preparing an explanation to the commission with information about the circumstances surrounding the recording and its recovery.
Senior counsel for the Mass Casualty Commission, Emily Hill, said the commission received word from the Justice Department on July 8, 2022, that a recording may exist. The commission has requested an affidavit from the RCMP explaining how the audio of the meeting came to be provided at this late date.
Michael Scott of Patterson Law, whose firm represents more than a dozen families of the 22 victims in the killings, said he has questions about why the recording was provided so late, nearly a month after the commission's public proceedings finished.
"It would have been really helpful to have that recording back when we could ask witnesses questions about it."
Scott said he's having a hard time reconciling Lucki's testimony — which he characterized as saying there had been "no particular interest" in the firearms being mentioned — with the recording.
While Scott said he may not go so far as to say there was political interference, it is "concerning" when powerful people use their position to push certain objectives that may not be appropriate.
He also questioned why the most senior people in the RCMP spent so much time, 10 days after the killings, focused on strategic communications. Issues like pushing through gun legislation were a "distraction" that potentially affected the RCMP's ability to do other things, like getting information to victims' families and investigating, he said.
"Do you not have more important things to do than worrying about the public perception?" he said. "We would have thought that perhaps there were bigger fish to fry."
Media 'chew us up … and spit us out'
Lucki was criticized for the meeting during testimony at the commission.
Lia Scanlan, former communications director for the Nova Scotia RCMP, wrote in a 2021 email to Lucki that what was said during the meeting was "appalling, unprofessional and extremely belittling."
In the recording, Lucki's tone is firm and sometimes sympathetic, but it is clear she is upset with the communications from the Nova Scotia division to RCMP headquarters and the public.
"I don't want to hurt people when they're hurting.… I know people are working as hard as they can, but we have a responsibility, and every time we've dropped the ball on … providing information, you know, who's … filled that gap? The media's filled the gap, retired members who haven't been in the field for 10, 15, 20 years are filling that gap. Why? Because we — we are not filling that gap," she says.
"To watch the media chew us up, eat us up and spit us out, and to watch what, or to hear what the minister and the prime minister had to say about the RCMP's inability to communicate, I will never forget it."
Sharon Tessier, the RCMP's director general of national communication at the time, eventually took responsibility at the meeting for leaving Lucki with the impression that the information about the guns would be included in the speaking notes for the news conference.
"Of course, this is just, like, the biggest cluster ever," she says in the recording. "It all got bunged up because, I don't know if it's because … we had so many people inserting themselves, and so, I take full responsibility for telling you they were in his notes. That was my understanding."
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with files from Angela MacIvor
