The troubled Toronto Port Authority is again turning to the federal auditor
general in a bid to silence critics amid a controversy over finances involving
Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt.
Auditor General Sheila Fraser Fraser
advised the independent, federally-funded authority in September that she has no
mandate to audit the organization.
But Mark McQueen, chairman of the
authority's board of directors, wrote Fraser again Wednesday pleading with her
to change her mind.
In his letter, McQueen says Fraser's
refusal to get involved "was unfortunate news."
He is trying to refute allegations by
critics of irregularities in the payment of questionable expenses involving
Raitt.
McQueen points out that the authority
has received a clean bill of financial health for its 2008 financial statements
from its independent auditor, Deloitte LLP.
That hasn't stopped opposition
parties from raising the matter repeatedly in the House of Commons, zeroing in
on the fact that Raitt, who used to be president of the port authority, has been
accused of signing off on some of her own expense claims.
"As the TPA has nothing to hide and
has done its best to be as open and transparent as possible, your inability to
review these accusations has given TPA detractors the luxury of claiming that
there remain unanswered questions regarding the financial, operating and
governing affairs of the TPA," McQueen wrote to Fraser.
McQueen argues that it's in the
public interest for Fraser to provide "a second independent, objective,
fact-based review that all stakeholders may rely upon."
Barring that, McQueen asks Fraser to
at least agree to review a special audit that the authority is prepared to have
conducted by "an independent, arms-length third-party accounting firm," other
than Deloitte.
Raitt has cast herself as someone
who's been unjustly caught in the middle of a dispute between feuding factions
on the authority's board.
Among other things, former board
chair Michele McCarthy has alleged that she refused to approve a $3,000 expense
claim for a trip to London, England, so Raitt signed off on it herself.
The authority maintains that claim
and other allegedly questionable expenses were in fact pre-approved as part of
its 2008 budget process.
Raitt has also come under fire for a
political fundraiser that was organized out of the port authority's offices,
using its email address list.
The Liberals have asked Elections
Canada, as well as Parliament's independent ethics and lobbying watch dogs to
investigate that affair.