:canada: Trudeau and finance minister accused of new conflict of interest

[ATraveller]

Rent-relief program becomes new front in fight between Liberals, opposition | CTV News

That is because the CMHC ended up contracting out administration of the Canada Emergency Commercial Rent Assistance program to a mortgage lender where the husband of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s chief of staff is a senior executive. That contract with MCAP was initially worth $56 million when the rent-relief program was launched in May and later expanded to $84 million in July.

The root of the dispute goes back to April 24, when Trudeau announced Ottawa had reached an agreement in principle with all provinces and territories to implement the rent-relief program, which promised to reduce the rent for small businesses by 75 per cent through subsidies and loans to their landlords.

Trudeau said at the time the CMHC would administer the program, a decision the Liberals are now defending. Finance Minister Bill Morneau’s spokeswoman Maeva Proteau says the Crown corporation was considered the best fit because it deals with mortgages and has the best understanding of Canada’s real-estate market.

But then CMHC, which describes its singular mission as “to make housing affordable for everyone in Canada,” outsourced administration of the program. According to CMHC spokeswoman Audrey-Anne Coulombe, that was because it did “not have the internal capacity to stand up the program in short order.”

That should have been obvious to the Liberals from the start, say the Conservatives, who argue the program should have been given to the Canada Revenue Agency. It is already managing a variety of support programs related to the COVID-19 pandemic, such as the federal wage subsidy.

This one isn’t over yet:

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