DWhite hate to say this yes Basi and Virk did plead out as all criminals are allowed to do and yes the government paid for their lawyers as is government policy, they were not bought out, All of the documents from that the NDP wanted after the trial were handed to them, every single piece of paper including backed up email’s etc, and the NDP has had how many years now and not one single shred of evidence of any wrong doing except for Basi and Virk, not even enough mud to throw at the liberals so no buy out at all, just idiots selling insider information and it didn’t even work for CN rail won the day, Glen Clark use government lawyers for his defence and Vandersam used lawyers for his defence
Hell I bet even Adrian Dix used government lawyers for when he forged the letter he back dated during the Glenn Clark scandal
Basi and Virk plead guilty just before cabinet ministers were supposed to testify under oath.
Government policy does allow the use of lawyers during court cases but as a previous thread pointed out way back governments can and will go after the money in the case of a guilty verdict. Say whatever you want about the CN Rail situation and whether Basi and Virk were just a couple of idiots selling inside information that didn’t work, optics indicate that the government of the day sure wanted information about who knew what and when shut down as quickly as possible.
And if you are happy with paying $6M in lawyer fees for a couple of guilty idiots when they actually didn’t have to … then this discussion will go nowhere as well.
And serious question because I am not 100% sure… Were the lawyers hired by Basi and Virk government lawyers. I thought Basi and Virk were in it up to their necks with the $6M and that was why they decided to plead out. I didn’t think the government was paying for anything until the guilty plea.
and Adrian Dix admitting he forged a letter during the Glen Clark scandal what did he get for that and don’t forget the government paid for his lawyers. like I said I don’t like that policy but all governments use it for it is not a priority to taxpayers
It’s 2016 folks… why in this day and age are you guys bringing up pre-2001 political scandals? lol
But I’ll leave this short comment here anyway: If the NDP somehow got rid of Adrian Dix, then the Liberals won’t able to remind the voters that the NDP today are the same as 1990s NDP. It’s the Liberals’ weapon of choice and that’s how they got elected four times.
Jabber63 I really don’t get where you are going with this.
You don’t like a policy but you defend it because of something that happened almost 20 years ago. And even then it wasn’t quite the same. What lawyers did Dix use when he wasn’t charged with anything.
Of course there are staff lawyers and one of them probably called him an idiot and told him to come clean with the backdating before any further expenses and trouble would accrue.
If you want to use the defense that the other guys did it too, then you are allowing precedent for Dix’s bad behaviour from WAC Bennett’s years in office or before.
And worse, if you are going to use Dix every time the Liberals have a scandal, then be prepared for NDP partisans using BCRail or some other applicable scandal from the current Liberals to explain away the bad behaviour of a future NDP government. I am sure you wouldn’t accept that.
No my examples were for the purpose of usage of government lawyers, to show that no matter who is in power they all use government lawyers even if the person is guilty in the long run or not. it is to show there is no appetite to change the system. you can bring up any liberal scandal you want to does not bother me, BCRail dealt with no smoking gun, fast ferries both parties were idiots on that one, Christy Clark scandal of using staff for political purposes dealt with and electorate still put her back in power. did they use government lawyers more then likely, is it a major issue not at all
as for Dix, as chief of staff for Glen Clark he was entitled to government lawyers, and good for him if he used them
and as for Basi and Virk normal plea deals bargaining nothing more
again no smoking gun, no second shooter in the grassy knole