BC Rail lobbyist boasted of bureaucrat's help

A topbureaucratoffered help to lobbyists working for a BC Rail bidder while the public sale of the Crown-owned railway was underway, a defence lawyer alleged Wednesday at the political corruption trial of three former government workers.

Defence lawyer Michael Bolton read out in court part of an email about information exchanged between a member of Pilothouse Public Affairs andthen-deputy minister of finance Paul Taylor while they were on a fishing trip.

"Paul was making it clear he will be there for us," writes lobbyist Brian Kieran to his colleagues, after describing how Taylor tried to get the lobby firm work with a car dealer association,in August 2003.

At that time, Kieran and his colleagues were also working for Colorado-based OmniTrax, one of three bidders for the Crown-owned BC Rail.

The former government workers on trial in B.C. Supreme Court are accused of taking bribes from the firm in exchange for confidential government documents.

Witness questions email content

The email, entered Wednesday as an exhibit, mentions a meeting Taylor had with Glen Ringdal, president of the B.C. Automobile Dealers Association. It states the government official told the man he would have to pay about $50,000 a year for good government relations work.

In an email reply later that same day, Pilothouse's Jamie Elmhirst replies, "Yah, well I could come up with this kind of great intel too if I lived next door to a blabby deputy minister!"

In court, Bolton asked Martyn Brown, Liberal Premier Gordon Campbell's chief of staff, about the memo, which had been leaked to a reporter in 2007 while lawyers prepared for the trial.

"The problem for the government, when this email was published in the press, was that it appears to indicate that the deputy minister of finance has got a very cozy relationship with Pilothouse," Bolton suggested to Brown on his 10th and final day of testimony.

"No, I don't know that the relationship with Pilothouse was the issue. It was how much, if any, of this email was correct," Brown said.

Politician assisted police

Kieran has been named as an upcoming key witness for the Crown. His colleague, Elmhirst, had left his position as a ministerial assistant with the B.C. government to join the lobby firm only 23 days before the email was written, Bolton told court.

Bolton represents former government aide Dave Basi, who was working for the minister of finance when police raided thelegislature in December 2003. The search occurred one month after the controversial $1-billion sale of BC Rail to CN Rail.

Also charged with fraud and breach of trust is former aide Bobby Virk, while Basi's cousin Aneal Basi is charged with money laundering.

Earlier in court, Brown testified he learned on the same day of the search that the solicitor general had been co-operating with an RCMP investigation into the matter. However, he didn't know how far in advance Rich Coleman had been assisting police, he said.

Brown was asked if that would have been the normal method for police access to the legislature.

"You do know ... that the Speaker [of the legislature] is the one who decides if police officers should have access to the precincts of the legislature," Bolton asked.

"I actually know that now, I didn't know that at the time," Brown replied.

Brown also said that on the day of the political offices search, he was told ahead of time that the RCMP would tell the public no elected officials were being investigated.

"I don't remember how that came up. The point was made very emphatically," Brown said, adding that both Coleman and RCMP told him that's how the news of the unprecedented search would be announced.

Bolton alleged the decision on the announcement was part of an agreement struck because the government had helped police, but Brown replied that he didn't remember.