A lawyer for five citizens wanting a judge to throw Mayor Gregor Robertson and Coun. Geoff Meggs out of office for conflict of interest said Vision Vancouver should have returned a campaign donation to the city’s outside workers’ union.
David Wotherspoon told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Elliott Myers that Meggs knew he was at the Oct. 14, 2014 CUPE Local 1004 meeting in the Maritime Labour Centre to raise funds when he promised, on behalf of Robertson, to not contract out work. Local 1004 voted to donate $34,000 from its $70,000 political action fund to Vision Vancouver. Its national and B.C. headquarters matched the donation for a total $102,000. A leaked audio recording of the meeting was first reported by the Courier last October and the donation became a major issue in the election campaign.
“Here’s the specific benefit we’re going to confer upon you in the future,” Wotherspoon said April 1 in court. “Vision should not have accepted the money. When they got it, they should’ve given it back.”
Later in the meeting, Kyla Epstein of Local 1004’s political action committee said “our support is not unconditional” and the donation was meant to “carry favour” at the bargaining table. Wotherspoon argued that a quid quo pro is not necessary, only a link to a benefit. Epstein’s quote, he said, “is icing on the cake, it cements the link.”
The petitioners, led by CityHallWatch blogger and ex-Vision Vancouver member Randy Helten, want Myers to replace Robertson and Meggs with the 2014 election’s next-highest vote-getters, NPA’s Kirk LaPointe and Ian Robertson, respectively, or to ban Robertson and Meggs from voting on Local 1004’s contract. Myers reserved judgment after the March 31-April 1 hearing at the Law Courts.
Robertson did not attend court, but Meggs did with wife Jan O’Brien, the former NDP provincial secretary and outgoing Vancity chair, and Vision Vancouver co-chair Paul Nixey and executive director Stepan Vdovine. Meggs’s affidavit said he was only repeating party policy and was not in the meeting when Local 1004 members voted on the donation. Vision lawyer Bryan Baynham told Myers the petition was ill-conceived and improper and there is no evidence his clients did anything wrong.
“When you look at the two speakers that can be identified, the one speaker, the male speaker, to accept the committee’s recommendation, he makes no mention of Meggs, he makes no mention of there being a deal,” Baynham told Myers.
Wotherspoon complained to Myers that Robertson and Meggs, through their lawyer, insulted his clients when Baynham labelled them “do-gooders, citizens who think they have some right to talk about democracy and overturn election results.”
“The effect of that submission is to say that this case shouldn’t have been brought forward and that the respondents should be immunized from having their conduct reviewed,” Wotherspoon said.
Baynham originally sought to have the recording deemed inadmissible as hearsay. Meggs and Local 1004 recording secretary Jessica Landgraff agreed in affidavits that it sounded accurate, but alleged it was incomplete or edited. Landgraff’s affidavit said she made notes on her laptop and claimed the meeting lasted from 5 p.m. to 6:52 p.m. Myers is considering what weight it should be given in his decision.
Baynham continued to cast doubt on the recording in his submissions to Myers.
“We need to know the person who made the recording, who was this mischief maker? What was the setup with the reporter?” he told Myers. “Why were they out to manufacture a story? Were they part of the NPA campaign, to make mischief?”
No witnesses were called in the chambers hearing, which involved only the lawyers submitting sworn statements and arguing legal points.
A Courier reporter outside the meeting on Oct. 14, 2014 began to receive three audio files of the meeting via email while the meeting was in progress. The source, who is independent of the NPA, freely provided the recordings in the public interest totaling almost 79 minutes. Anonymity, for fear of retribution, was the sole condition requested and granted.
B.C. has no statutory limits on provincial or municipal donations, though a committee of the Legislature is mulling new expense rules. Earlier in 2014, Vision Vancouver unsuccessfully lobbied the provincial government to ban union and corporate political donations and opted against voluntary limits. The party eventually spent a B.C. municipal record $3.4 million in 2014. It retained a council majority, but lost its majorities on park and school boards.
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