Patrick Kinsella
Bill Tieleman’s 24 Hours Column
Tuesday March 17, 2009
More questions than answers
By BILL TIELEMAN
What we don't know is why would B.C. Rail have a lobbyist and pay him $297,000.
- Kevin McCullough, Bob Virk's defence lawyer in B.C. Legislature Raid case, in court March 12
Let's play 20 questions - can we figure out why B.C. Rail - a Crown corporation owned by the provincial government - paid well-connected B.C. Liberal Party insider Patrick Kinsella $6,000 per month for 49 months for a total of $297,000?
1 How did Kinsella - co-chair of the B.C. Liberal Party's 2001 and 2005 election campaigns - help B.C. Rail for $297,000?
2 Kinsella's firm, the Progressive Group, issued a statement Thursday that: "Mr. Kinsella was engaged by BC Rail to assist in understanding and interpreting the Core Review Process as to its potential impact on the Corporation. BC Rail sought counsel on what implications, if any, might affect the Crown Corporation's operations and their strategic plan going forward."
Can we see the reports or memos that B.C. Rail bought for $297,000?
3 B.C. Rail said Thursday it hired Kinsella to: "Provide strategic advice to our new President, Board of Directors, and Chair . . . specific to the Core Review process government was undertaking during that period, and general business communication advice."
What advice was needed after B.C. Rail was sold to CN Rail in November 2003?
4 Why did B.C. Rail need Kinsella's help when it had highly paid executives and a government-appointed board of directors?
5 In court, lawyer Kevin McCullough said a 2004 e-mail to then B.C. Rail Vice-President Kevin Mahoney from another executive asked: "Why are we paying this guy?" and the answer was that Kinsella was a "backroom Liberal."
Why did a B.C. Rail executive not know about Kinsella's role providing "advice" to B.C. Rail for about three years?
6 What was Kinsella's hourly rate, and those of any associates working for B.C. Rail?
7 Did B.C. Rail put Kinsella's work out for a public tender and if not, why not?
8 Did Kinsella or his firms at any time conduct work for any of the other railway companies who bid for or supported bids for B.C. Rail - in other words, for CN Rail, CP Rail, OmniTRAX or Burlington Northern Santa Fe?
9 Did Kinsella or his firms act on behalf of B.C. Rail in dealing with any of those rail companies?
10 Why do Premier Gordon Campbell, Attorney General Wally Oppal and Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon state they can't say anything about Kinsella's B.C. Rail role because it is "before the courts" when B.C. Rail and Kinsella released statements and Kinsella is not under any investigation related to the David Basi and Bob Virk trial, the two government aides facing corruption charges.
Oops - out of space - and 10 questions left!
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28 comments:
How about this; "Being a personal & business friend of the Premier, did Kinsella feel himself to be entitled to BC Taxpayers money, in guise of doing 'consulting' work of government projects?"
Oh by the way, didn't BC Rail have lawyers with enough savvy "in understanding and interpreting the Core Review Process as to its potential impact on the Corporation?" Do only friends of the Premier have the savvy to understand the BC Rail sell-off?
Let's end Liberal autocracy!
Hmmm...
Its pretty basic. Gordo wanted to pass along some money to the guy and did so. At the time, who would notice, and of course it wasn't King Gordo's money, it was ours. Always greese you freinds as they come in handy now and again.
These payments do not make any sense and I would question whether other Crown Corporations paid Kinsella for advice on Core Review and other dealings with the new government in 2001.
Think about it. As a Crown Corporation you are to start dealing with a new leadership and new government. In a desperate attempt to keep your ear to the ground about any new changes (Crown Corps hate change) you hear about this guy Kinsella who is a close advisor to Premier Campbell. You then decide to hire Kinsella to build relationships with the key people who are in the Premier's Office. I would raise questions/research other possible Kinsella contracts with BC Hydro, BC Buildings, BC Ferries, BC Transmission Corp, ICBC, BC Lottery Corp, BC Securities Commission, BC Pavillion Corp all dating back to 2001.
go here
http://contributions.electionsbc.gov.bc.ca/pcs
/SA1Search.aspx
enter peter kinsella
contribute almost $70,000 of what was most likely bc tax payers money no problem business as usual
Elections BC PCS result for Peter Kinsella = $67,964.00 to BC Liberals.
Nothing wrong here. Its a free country.
Peter, Patrick, Paul, .... who the heck is Peter?
There is no longer any question that Patrick Kinsella's unfettered access to the halls of this govt must be thoroughly investigated. There are just too many questions.
Too many questions, with any combination of answers being most troubling.
Not even Patrick can deny that.
He wouldn't have issued a release otherwise.
how do we stop this orgy! I mean rape of our hard earned tax dollars !
He kept his mouth shut!
A core review? 4 years?
My question is this,who moved the documents and placed them where they would be found?
Don`t be surprised if more documents are found.
In an update- Premier Campbell is sending all Liberal executives and financial contributors to a 2 week seminar in New York called "Fleecing The Flock" hosted by AIG.
Anonymous 11:24
Sorry I meant Patrick not Peter
Today its March 17, 2009 and back on June 17, 1986, Mr. Hanson rose in the BC Legislature to comment on Mr. Kinsella and said:
"Mr. Chairman, one of the reasons the Orwellian nightmare is so pervasive in this province is...."
Once in office, the Libs subsidized their hold on same by making the taxpayer subsidize the machine.
Hey, that's a good election issue.
Is patrick related to Warren?
One more question:
How many brown bags were used to pay Kinsella?
See? It really makes no difference - provincial or federal - gLiberals are what they are - and Iggy-eyebrows wants his turn at the trough - definitely not getting my vote. . . .
FOLLOW THE MONEY . . . Deep Throat
The GREAT SATAN
The horizontal lines over Pat Kinsella's picture make a nice touch but I'd rather see vertical lines.
Type Bill Tieleman into the Elections BC Contributions site and you will see where his bias is.
Anon 11.21 pm
Mr. Tieleman has never mis-represented his bias, but Mr. Tieleman isn`t getting paid by crown corporations!
It`s not Bill`s lips that that are sucking from the public trough.
Mr. Tieleman isn`t being paid to lobby goverment and being paid by goverment,god you guys are desperate!
230 media spinners at the PAB waiting for may 12th to get the ax-
The Province of BC has spoken!
Be afraid, be very, very afraid.
From January 5th, 2005 to Dec 5th, 2007 Mr. T contributed $3,792.00 to the NDP.......
Kinsella put down $67,964.00 to the BC Liberals from June 6, 2005 to Dec 31st 2007
Now this could mean that Elections BC, via its PCS program, isn't telling us what's happened in the last year eg. 2008, nor how much has gone into the pot in the last two and half months.
But perhaps thats pushing the Open and Transparency aspect a touch to far because it might reveal just how much the political parties are in receipt of current donations in the lead up to the provincial election year of 2009.
Tieleman like many folks make political contributions to a party of their choice.So who really cares is he dropped a few bucks into a party? He's not a lobbyist. Last time I looked around I didn't see him on the payroll of the Official Opposition
Kinsellas
There are three Kinsellas who regularly appear in the news:
W.P. (William Patrick) Kinsella - tournament Scrabble player and author (wrote a little story that was made into the movie 'Field of Dreams'), lives in BC
Patrick Kinsella - vampire: often seen in the shadows, daylight is fatal, suckling off of the public tit in BC seems to be a major source of nourishment
Warren Kinsella - plays in the punk rock band 'Shit From Hell' and is a senior Liberal strategist, lives east of the Rockies (ran as a federal Liberal in BC in '97... lost)
As far as I can tell - I'm not a genealogist - the three are unrelated.
Bill T--Where are the results from the Ipsos reid battleground poll? you said march 18 to 19 for release,were now march 20th?
Has the poll been hidden,are the results so bad for the liberals that the poll has been buried?
Could you find out when or if it`s going to be released.
Thanks bill
The Ipsos Canada poll will be released on Monday sometime I'm told. Also posted an update on my polling item on this blog.
Leonard Krog made some very effective comments on the 6pm news...
Investigate Patrick Kinsella's contracts with this govt: Tendered, scope of work, etc.
I think this is a much better line of (benign) attack, than the "friends and insiders" messaging.
The latter will resonate, in terms of any alleged corruption, if and when the former has been examined, by forensic audit, etc.
For the sake of clarity, here's what the CBC had to say on Patrick Kinsella 49 month payments:
"The NDP says Kinsella claims he was hired by BC Rail to help with the provincial government's core review of all its operations, but the review ended in 2002 and Kinsella was paid until 2005."
Perchance, that as Chairman PK sat at the desk of his Progressive Group company he thought that the public, and Mr. T, would be satisfied with a press release from the company explaining all.
March 19, 2009
"Mr. Kinsella was engaged by BC Rail to assist in understanding and interpreting the Core Review Process as ........SNIP"
Okay? Satisfied!
Well not really.
Where's the press release from his other company, Progressive Holdings, that received funds and which forms a part of the $297,000 obtained over the 49 months singular contract?
Why would BC Rail hire someone and then pay them via two companies?
Who sought to have the contract payments split in two?
Were there two contracts signed?
Why couldn't the Progressive Group handle the whole contract?
Why didn't BC Rail hire a competing consulting company that had absolutely no political ties to the BC Liberals, especially when Mr. Kinsella was their campaign manager?
I'd be mighty happy if there were a SECOND press release from Mr. Kinsella's desk, this time while sitting as President of Progressive Holdings, explaining what his company did.
Next round, BC Rail Board of Directors have some explaining to do as to why they hired one company, but then paid out on two different letterheaded company invoices........
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