For the week of Dec. 13, 2020:
Darryl Plecas has left the Speaker’s chair to the NDP’s Raj Chouhan. But not without releasing another bombshell report.
Plecas served for three years until Premier John Horgan called an election a year earlier than required. As promised, independent Plecas did not seek re-election in Abbotsford South.
In the Unfinished Business report, Plecas called on lawmakers of every stripe to push for change and continue his quest to end corruption.
On this edition of theBreaker.news Podcast, Plecas tells host Bob Mackin he is highly critical of the house leaders for allowing disgraced Clerk Craig James to retire without paying back a penny of his ill-gotten gains. James and ex-Sergeant-at-Arms Gary Lenz (who also retired in disgrace) remain the subjects of a criminal investigation.
Plecas also reveals the house leaders’ indifference to a whistleblower’s complaint about workplace harassment.
On the the opaque culture of the Legislature:
“From the very beginning it was an uphill struggle because of the structure of the place, the way they did business, the absence of any kind of mechanisms to deal appropriately with wrongdoing.”
On the lack of whistleblower protection at the Legislature:
“We still don’t have that. How on earth is that possible in this day and age, how is that possible when in the meantime the government introduced whistleblower legislation respecting government employees?”
On the Legislative Press Gallery:
“There are certain members of the Press Gallery who moved heaven and earth to trash every single thing we did, and in some cases without even reading what it is they were talking about.”
Also on this edition, Plecas’ Chief of Staff, Alan Mullen, discusses the case of the mace.
Victoria Police are investigating tampering in the Speaker’s office. The alarm that secures the Legislature’s mace on a fireplace mantle was disabled in February. It went unnoticed until late October.
Hear Mullen tell Mackin the motive may not have been theft, but to place a listening device in the Speaker’s office.
Plus Pacific Northwest and Pacific Rim headlines and commentary.
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