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Canada’s Trudeau Loses Finance Minister, Faces Questions On Conflict Of Interest

Reports from Canada overnight have indicated the nation’s Finance Minister Bill Morneau will resign amidst claims of conflict of interest linked to the prominent WE Charity group.
Formerly known as Free the Children (Enfants Entraide), and founded in 1995, to help with youth empowerment around the world, Morneau, it is claimed, is stepping down after it was discovered he had not repaid travel costs initially covered by the charity while travelling to see the work done on their behalf.
Morneau did, however, claim he had only recently realised he had not paid C$41,000 – NTD$ 910,000 – and had make efforts to pay the money back.
Morneau is now planning to resign his post in the nation’s Liberal Party cabinet in addition to his role as an MP in central Toronto.
Reports also indicate Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau could face questions on his own involvement with WE Charity.
WE Charity logo

“I met with the prime minister today to inform him that I did not plan to run again in the next election,” Morneau told the press. “It has never been my plan to run for more than two federal election cycles.”

Prime Minister Trudeau, in trying to recover from the latest in a long line of scandals affecting his time in office then offered Morneau his thanks for his “unwavering leadership and commitment to service” as well as his “advice, and close friendship” throughout his tenure.

And as become a recurring theme in his time as prime minister, Trudeau was once again accused of throwing others under the proverbial bus to save his own political skin.

Jagmeet Singh, the New Democratic Party leader said: “Canadians need a government that is focused on helping them, not on their own scandals. In the middle of a financial crisis, Justin Trudeau has lost his finance minister. Every time he gets caught breaking ethics laws, he makes someone else take the heat. That’s not leadership,” – an M.O. echoed by Canada’s Conservative leader Andrew Scheer who accused Mr Trudeau of ‘scapegoating his finance minister.’

 

Mark Buckton

Mark is a journalism vet of 20 years with most of those years spent in Tokyo, Japan, as a columnist for The Japan Times and numerous other publications. His work has appeared on CNN, in the BBC, NPR, and in several dozen other media forms and publications across five continents.

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