Grants awarded by Normandeau : Marc-Yvan Côté argues that Roche has not obtained any favor

File PHOTO, DIDIER DEBUSSCHÈRE
Marc-Yvan Côté

Jean-Luc Lavallée

Tuesday, 19 December 2017 16:43

UPDATE
Tuesday, 19 December 2017 16:55

Look at this article

The ex-liberal organizer Marc-Yvan Côté denies having organized a system of secret funding for the benefit of the ex-minister Nathalie Normandeau, and argues that the consulting engineering firm Roche has obtained no favour in his reign.

In a query “communication records held by third parties,” filed in the record of the court recently, the lawyer of Marc-Yvan Côté, Me Jacques Larochelle, calls for a long list of documents and information to the ministry of municipal Affairs on the granting of subsidies between 2000 and 2012 – the period covered by the charges – in order to support its argument in the context of a trial.

Mr. Côté, a former liberal minister who later became vice-president of business development at Roche, is facing 12 counts of fraud over $ 5,000, fraud towards the government, breach of trust, the subscription to a cash election in the commission of the offence and bribery of public officials.

The public ministry says it is in the query, will attempt to prove that Rock has received “a disproportionate share of the grants from the MAMROT” when Ms. Normandeau was the head of the department. The Crown has listed in a table several grants for projects related to the remediation of the waters in Carleton-sur-Mer, Cloridorme, Gaspé, Îles-de-la-Madeleine, Maria, Paspebiac, Saint Francis of Assisi and Saint-Siméon.

Of the regions under-subsidized “

Marc-Yvan Côté emphasizes that the ” suspect projects are all located in rural counties of eastern Quebec, the regions historically under-funded by MAMROT and where the firm Rock is firmly established “. He wants to show that all of the other engineering firms have obtained “support rate increased similar to those of the firm Rock” during the reporting period.

At the time, the budgetary allocation under the ministry of Nathalie Normandeau were ” much higher than those of his predecessors and successors, which explains the granting of greater amounts and high demand for the use of the discretionary power of the minister “. Finally, he argues that the clients of Rock have ” obtained legitimately rate increased aid of Nathalie Normandeau, due to reasons of public interest, without favor “.

“The presence of a causal link between the secret funding alleged and obtaining benefits is an essential element of the alleged offences, the applicant and the centerpiece of the theory of the public ministry for which the applicant has the right to call in question the probative value “, concludes the defence.

The various motions filed by the defense lawyers, including this one, that will be discussed in January and February next at the palace of justice of Quebec. This includes both requests a stay of proceedings (judgment in Jordan and leaks media) filed in the registry in the last week. The trial was chaired by judge André Perreault has to start, in theory, on 9 April 2018.