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Integrity commissioner should apologize to mayor: Doug Ford
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TORONTO - Councillor Doug Ford is demanding Toronto integrity commissioner Janet Leiper apologize to Mayor Rob Ford.
“Because of the lack of her due diligence, the results have had major ramifications for my brother, it hurt his family, it hurt him financially, it hurt his kids and most of all, it hurt the city,” Ford said Thursday. “I think it is about time the apology commissioner apologizes, minimum.
“If it was up to me, I’d ask her to step down … she has almost destroyed a family over her lack of due diligence.”
The mayor’s conflict of interest case stretches back to a 2010 council decision that ordered him, then a councillor, to pay back improper donations he accepted for his youth football foundation from lobbyists and others who do business with the city. Leiper made the recommendation to council.
Ford refused to pay the money and when a follow-up report came to council last year, he spoke to council and then voted with the majority of council to drop the issue. That vote led to the conflict of interest suit against the mayor which saw him ordered out of office late last year. Ford won an appeal last month on the basis the original 2010 council decision was invalid.
Councillor Ford argued the matter wouldn’t have gone to court if the integrity commissioner had not made the original recommendation.
“I don’t see any apology from the apology commissioner,” he said.
Ford — who said Leiper asks him to apologize “every second week” — said he’d like to see Leiper apologize on the floor of council, publicly and in writing.
“The least thing the integrity commissioner can do is apologize,” he said. “She was wrong and we want an apology.
“Let’s see if she can do the right thing and if she can’t do the right thing, she shouldn’t be here.”
Ford and the mayor both left the council chamber during the integrity commissioner’s report to avoid breaching the conflict of interest rules.
Councillor Adam Vaughan said Leiper doesn’t owe the mayor an apology.
“Everything she did, she did in good faith,” Vaughan said. “She did not make a mistake in her analysis of the problem or in her recommendations to council.”
Vaughan said council doesn’t owe Ford an apology either.
“I think we were given good advice, advice that some judges said was appropriate, others said it was not,” he said.
Deputy Mayor Doug Holyday grilled Leiper during Thursday’s council meeting.
“She didn’t seek any legal advice on the interpretation,” Holyday said.
City staff confirmed Thursday the mayor could ask the city to reimburse his legal costs from the conflict case but Rob Ford wouldn’t say if he would.
“I can’t talk about anything before the courts because it is still before the courts,” the mayor said.
Holyday said it is up to the mayor whether he seeks that money.
“Knowing him, I don’t think he will but I think the public should at least know that he’s probably entitled to,” Holyday said. “He’s out of pocket an awful lot of money … I’d only be guessing but I’m certain it is between one and two years salary.”
From: Toronto Sun
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