Mike Duffy is no ‘victim,’ Stephen Harper says as he attacks senator over expenses

OTTAWA – A combative Prime Minister Stephen Harper came out swinging Wednesday on the Senate expenses scandal, attacking Sen. Mike Duffy for playing the “victim” card and insisting he didn’t threaten the senator with expulsion from the upper chamber.

Harper denied intimidating Duffy, contrary to Duffy’s assertions to the Senate Tuesday that he had been forced to go along with a byzantine secret scheme to repay some of his Senate expenses.

In a sharp change of tone for how government is responding to the Senate crisis, Harper made his strongest comments to-date on the political scandal – which has embroiled the Conservative party and the Prime Minister’s Office for the past six months.

The compelling political theatre played out in the House of Commons as the official Opposition NDP and Liberals continued to grill Harper on what role he and the Prime Minister’s Office played in a secret $90,000 payment by then-chief of staff Nigel Wright to Duffy to cover improper Senate expenses.

“Mr. Duffy now says he is a victim because I told him he should repay his expenses,” a furious Harper said in question period.

“You’re darn right I told him he should repay his expenses!”

For nearly 25 straight minutes, Harper rose repeatedly in the House of Commons to address Duffy’s assertions and the surgical inquisition of the opposition parties, breaking from his custom of only responding to the first few questions from party leaders.

After months of being on the defensive, the prime minister was looking to change the tone on the Senate affair. At the same time, just down the hall on the other side of Parliament’s Centre Block, the upper chamber was debating the future of Duffy and two other former Conservative senators.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair asked whether, as Duffy had asserted, the prime minister threatened to boot him out of the Senate if Duffy didn’t co-operate on repaying the expenses.

“When he (Duffy) asked, in fact, I told our entire caucus and staff that my view was that his expense claims were inappropriate and they should be repaid,” Harper said. “That particular time, Mr. Speaker, did I threaten him with expulsion? No.

“But when inappropriate expense claims are made, I expect a corrective action to be taken and if it is not taken, the person who does not take corrective action could not expect to continue to sit as a member of the Conservative party,” he added, to raucous applause from Tory MPs.

Mulcair also challenged Harper on whether he was being truthful in his claims that Wright acted alone. Harper maintained, as he has before, that he did not know of the secret payment and would never have approved such a scheme. Read More Original Post