LETTER

Support for Trudeau in Attorney General/SNC Lavalin affair 

I support the efforts made by the officials of the Trudeau government to inform the AG Jody Wilson-Raybould of the dire consequences of proceeding with a criminal prosecution involving SNC-Lavalin. It is with great regret that Ms Raybould did not see the wisdom of pursuing a negotiated settlement with SNC-L, which would keep one of Canada’s major engineering firms intact and protect the thousand of jobs of the employees of SNC-L. Instead Ms Raybould proceeded with a criminal prosecution of the corporation. 

This was a gross error in judgement and here are the reasons why: The senior individuals who perpetrated the crime of bribery in Libya, were a rogue element including one senior sales executive and a few senior executives of the company. The remaining members of SNC-Lavalin’s executive and its Board of Directors were not aware of their transgressions. When they learned what had happened, those employees were terminated and a new CEO was hired to put things right and prevent a re-occurrence from happening. The truth is 99.99% of SNC-L employees were not involved. Does it make sense to proceed with a criminal prosecution that could destroy the company, cause massive job losses in Quebec not only to SNC-L but hundreds of other companies that support SNC-L. The loss of taxes would affect the Quebec and Federal Governments as well as local governments. It would be hard to replace those jobs and one of the world’s best engineering companies. It made no sense for AG Raybould to proceed with a criminal prosecution when the crooks no longer worked at SNC-L. A negotiated settlement was the right choice. The AG willfully got it wrong. 

William Finseth

(Manoir des Trembles)

Gatineau