OTTAWA — The Senate’s defence committee will finally get an answer on Monday over whether Vice-Admiral Mark Norman will agree to testify over the circumstances around his controversial prosecution.
But it may be too late, as the Senate committee is facing a deadline crunch with the chamber set to rise for its summer break later this week. The Conservative deputy chair of the committee has said it is no longer possible to conduct the study as originally envisioned, in part because the government side won’t agree to extend meetings past this week.
In correspondence sent Sunday and obtained by the National Post, Norman’s lawyer Marie Henein raised concerns about the potential study, telling the committee’s clerk her view is that senators may not have the time and information they need to fully examine the matter. She said she’s concerned the committee’s brief study “will not be of assistance to the Canadian public.”
Henein also said she’d only received the committee’s actual invitation requests this weekend, because they had been sent to a general email inbox at her law firm rather than to her directly.
At this point, even if Norman agrees to testify, it’s unclear what form that testimony would take. Conservative Sen. Jean-Guy Dagenais has asked the committee to meet on Monday to discuss the matter. He said in a letter to the committee’s chair he intends to withdraw his motion for a study.
“I have already submitted a list of 10 people to hear and I understand that about 20 other names could be added,” Dagenais’ letter said. “At least 4 to 5 days of public meetings should be spent to hear them. It has become impossible.”
The Senate defence committee voted on May 28 to “examine and report on the circumstances that led the RCMP to lay, now stayed, criminal charges against Vice-Admiral Mark Norman, including the scope and nature of the involvement in that process by any other persons.”
The criminal charge against Norman — one count of breach of trust, stemming from allegations he leaked confidential information about the government’s disposition towards a project to procure a supply ship for the Royal Canadian Navy — was stayed on May 8.
Along with Norman, the motion named Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan and Chief of the Defence Staff General Jonathan Vance as witnesses who should be invited for testimony. It also authorized the committee to invite anyone else it chooses.
But for the committee to continue meeting after the Senate rises, the Senate’s leadership would have to permit it. Dagenais told the National Post he met with Sen. Peter Harder, the government’s representative in the Senate, last week and was told no permission would be forthcoming. “Sen. Harder told me directly, no,” Dagenais said in an interview.
In his letter to the committee chair, Dagenais said Harder’s refusal is “in line with all the actions of Justin Trudeau’s Liberals to literally prevent the truth from coming out in this political scandal.”
The delay over the committee’s study is in part because Norman’s testimony was prioritized above all else and the committee has been waiting to hear an answer. But it turns out there was miscommunication, as Henein was unaware until this weekend that the clerk had been emailing the formal invitation to her law firm’s general information inbox and not her direct email. (The firm’s website does list the general email as the contact info under Henein’s biography.)
In an email sent to the clerk on Sunday, Henein said she’d been “surprised” at the lack of communication from the committee, noting she’d also received no voicemail, letters or faxes. “My email is well known,” she told the clerk, noting it is on court documents and on correspondence with many government departments.
“I have further repeatedly followed up with my client, Vice Admiral Norman, as late as this past Friday who confirmed he had not been approached by anyone on the Senate Committee,” she said.
Henein said they take the committee’s request “very seriously,” but are weighing the concerns they have over how the testimony will take place.
“Given that I have spent two and a half years on this matter, I am not sure how a meaningful inquiry can proceed without a detailed review of the case and documents,” she said. “(Oral) testimony in response to questions asked by individuals who have not reviewed the extensive record as to how these charges came to be laid and how the case proceeded in my view will not be of assistance to the Canadian public.”
Henein concludes the email by saying they are deliberating and “will respond to you tomorrow.”
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This story was updated with information about Sen. Dagenais’ letter withdrawing his motion.
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