The Last Exile

When news of Federal Conservative cabinet Minister Helena Guergis had her public tantrum at airline security officials in PEI hit the news I wasn’t among the almost the chorus calling her out for rude, boorish behaviour. Not because it wasn’t rude, boorish and at the very least unbecoming public conduct for a cabinet minister. It wasn’t even out of sense of sympathy for one who has many times been caught being rude, loud and obnoxious in public. I took a different view of the matter from most Canadians and thought she had a point – not in being rude but in objecting to not receiving ’special’ or ‘different’ treatment by airline security officials. She is a Canadian MP and a cabinet minister representing the highest level of government, and if a Canadian MP and cabinet official comes under the same insane intense scrutiny as a potential terrorist we are all in a great deal of trouble. It seems there is no place for common sense when it comes to the conduct of airline security officials which is why the government keeps raising airport taxes way beyond the actual threat level.

But I get why most Canadians were very vocal in their disgust of her public meltdown. Canadians like to think everyone gets treated the same and they like to see everyone without exception being treated the same by the government bureaucracy. Somehow it makes the indignity and foolishness of the matter far more palatable for the rest of us to endure with a measure of good grace.

Now there is a reason for our criminal justice system is conducted openly and members of the public are welcomed to attend almost without exception the sitting of any criminal court. Not only do we need to see justice being metered out but we also want to ensure that those who we entrust enforce and administer justice are not behaving in an incompetent or shoddy fashion and we need to believe all of us will be treated equally as well as fairly before the criminal justice system.

All of which brings me to the Rahim Jaffer matter and the general outrage by the public over the resolution which I also share. This backroom plea deal which saw a former MP and current spouse to cabinet Minister Helena Guergis charged by police with a DUI, possession of cocaine and a traffic violation. The Crown in this case worked out a backroom deal with the defense counsel which saw all the charges; including the very serious charges of DUI and possession of cocaine withdrawn in exchange for a guilty plea to ‘careless driving’ and a small fine.

The Crown suggests this is the best possible outcome and there was a reasonable chance of not being able to successfully win a conviction for the more serious charges of DUI and possession of cocaine which is all very well and good – possibly even a realistic evaluation of the situation but justice was not seen to be done in an open and public manner and the public needs to know why there was no reasonable chance of conviction.

What we do know is there was a backroom plea bargain offered and accepted and public is left entirely out of the loop in a matter. Police are public servants and we need to know they are doing their job competently. We do know Mr. Jaffer was administered a breathalyzer test in which he did not pass hence to laying of a DUI charge. If there is a procedure loophole or the breathalyzer tests are somewhat unreliable – it is within the public interest to know. The police allege they found cocaine and the public needs to know the police are not setting up evidence willy-nilly but are operating in a fair and impartial matter within the bounds of applying the law equally to all. If the police officer(s) involved made procedure mistakes the public which foots the bills needs to know – we also need to be reassured that is nothing more than a one-off incidence. The public also needs to know there isn’t a two tiered justice system operating under our very noses and lady justice blindfold doesn’t slip depending on who appears before her.