Premier Jim Prentice announced a new program on Tuesday to help aboriginal people train for jobs in the construction industry. (CBC)
Premier Jim Prentice says it’s not surprising that a member of his government office staff would be involved in internal politics related to the Progressive Conservative party.
“I think it’s clear that people that work in the government have the ability to be involved in outside matters, including the phone call you’re referring to,” Prentice said Tuesday.
“(It) was made by Patty Misutka from her home to yourself,” the premier told CBC reporter John Archer. “That seems to me to be a personal matter.”
Misutka is the principal secretary in the premier’s office, and is also a member of the PCAA nomination committee, a body that has disqualified two candidates in recent Edmonton races, including Don Martin in Edmonton-Decore.
Martin said Monday it is “wholly inappropriate” for a high-ranking member of the premier’s staff to be involved when the party reviews which candidates should run for the PCs in the next Alberta election.
“It would make it appear that the premier’s office, or individuals in it, are picking and choosing the slate of candidates going forward,” Martin said.
Misutka’s role in the PCAA nomination committee came to light last week when she accidentally called a CBC reporter while trying to reach a candidate in the Tory race in Edmonton-Meadowlark. At the time, Misutka said she wasn’t doing party business on government time, because she was at home on the couch after going home sick on a workday.
Asked if Albertans can be confident the telephone call in question wouldn’t have been placed had Misutka been in the office that day, Prentice said: “The point is, she didn’t. She phoned you from her house.”
The premier also said he has spoken to Misutka about making sure there is separation between party business and work she does for the government.
“Certainly, we are clearly cognizant that my office is a government office. I understand that, and she’s fully aware of that.”
PCAA Executive Director Kelley Charlebois said the party’s board of directors “delegated the responsibility for nominations to this committee.”
Charlebois said this is similar to what the party did before the 2012 election. The committee, he said, is used in each nomination process by the party.
But a number of current and former MLAs who spoke to CBC News say that simply isn’t the case, that the provincial committee is a brand new entity.
Martin said didn’t know the PCAA nomination committee even existed, much less that one of the premier’s closest confidantes was a member.
He and many other party members say this is the first time this committee has been struck. In years past, the appropriateness of candidates was left up to local riding associations.
“Ideally, these things are kept at quite an arm’s length away from the caucus,” Martin said.
“The nominating of candidates is a party function, and the appointment of someone from the premier’s office erodes that division that should be there.”
The blurred lines between government work and party business, he said, “opens the premier’s office for questions I don’t believe the premier’s office should have to answer.”
