Letter: Stephen Harper is a poor choice to run AIMCo., and history knows it

By Letter to the Editor on November 27, 2024.

Dear editor:

Re: Former prime minister Stephen Harper’s appointment as chairman of Alberta Investment Management Corp. (AIMCo.)

Mr. Harper’s appointment is a poor choice, for at least four reasons.

First, his scruples are pliable. In 2011 his Conservative government became the first in centuries of Westminster Parliament governments, worldwide, to be found in contempt of Parliament for refusing to inform Parliament of the true costs of new fighter jets, of so-called prison reforms and of the real cost of his government’s corporate tax cuts.

He could not bring his government to honour its ethical obligations to Parliament and to Canada. He left us unable to know costs we had to pay.

Second, he showed poor judgement and impropriety when, under his administration, the logo of the Conservative Party of Canada was quietly added to and appeared on official Government of Canada cheques. Only when caught by the media and facing public outcry did he finally revert to the proper cheques. Good character does the right thing, even when no one is watching.

Third, he muzzled Canadian Government scientists, paid by taxpayers, so results of their work which conflicted with or disproved Conservatives’ beliefs were either suppressed or distorted to support Conservative Party propaganda.

This was fraud, perpetrated upon Canadians with our own money, yet he blithely ignored the wrongness of it. Casual fraudulence and an aversion to facts one finds unwelcome ill-suit the manager of a $160-billion fund.

Fourth, in spite of all the economic information available to a prime minister, and in spite of having a Master’s degree in economics, he told Canada in an October 2008 TV interview that no recession was coming because, “If we were going to have a recession, we would have had it by now.”

Eight weeks later our economy was hit by a freight train of a financial meltdown, and he and his government were shoveling money out the door at great speed to try and counter the recession he either could not or would not see. His October 2008 statement showed either wilful blindness, or chicanery.

There are better choices for chairman of AIMCo.

Yours truly,

Gregory R. Côté

Irvine

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