Disgraced Alliance aide masterminded property rights lobby that influenced party policy

Matthew Johnston worked for both the Canadian Property Rights Research Institute (CanPRRI) and Alliance MP Rahim Jaffer

By Aaron Freeman

OTTAWA: The disgraced Alliance political aide who impersonated his boss Rahim Jaffer on a Vancouver radio show, was a kingpin in a property rights group.
  Last week Canadians learned that Matthew Johnston, executive assistant to Alliance MP Rahim Jaffer, resigned after being caught pretending to be his boss during a Vancouver radio interview. Jaffer, who admitted to lying about the affair in order to protect Johnston, was demoted in caucus.
  What Canadians weren't told last week is that for years Johnston provided an inside track to advance the political cause of the property rights lobby and that the campaigns of the group he worked for were carried forward by Jaffer.
 

After questions were asked about the industry-funded lobby group CanPRRI, documents started dropping off its web page, including the advisory board list

  After working on Jaffer's nomination and leadership campaigns in 1997 and serving as his executive assistant for two years, Johnston left Ottawa in November 1999 to become the executive director of the Canadian Property Rights Research Institute (CanPRRI). He replaced Danielle Smith, who now serves on the Calgary Herald editorial board.
  CanPRRI's founding sponsors are mainly from the Alberta ranching industry. The group's mandate, according to its web site, is to "research and advocate the role of private property rights in creating and maintaining a free and prosperous society." CanPRRI has strong ties to the right-wing Fraser Institute, and solid links to the Alliance. The party's chief spokesperson Ezra Levant, was until recently on the group's board of advisors, as was Alliance MP James Rajotte. Before being elected, Rajotte was the executive assistant of former Alliance MP Ian McLelland. Recently elected to the Alberta legislature, McLelland was considered to have been a mentor to Jaffer.
  When he left Ottawa, Johnston had bold plans for CanPRRI. He told the Hill Times that his "goal is to take the organization national", and to establish "virtual offices across the country". However, Jaffer's office confirms that he was back in Ottawa within a few months, again working as Jaffer's executive assistant. When he returned, he maintained his post with CanPRRI.
  CanPRRI works on issues such as "Tobacco Freedom", which the organization describes as "an information campaign designed to educate and inform citizens and municipal politicians about the grave consequences for private property rights entailed in banning smoking in all indoor, publicly accessible places." The group has recruited U.S. religious organizations in its fight against municipal smoking bans in Canada.
  The group also actively opposes federal and provincial endangered species legislation. It has repeatedly criticized the proposed federal Species At Risk Act since November 1999, issuing press releases with Johnston as the media contact, and launching an ad campaign against the bill.
  While Johnston held his position with CanPRRI, many of the organization's causes were taken up by Jaffer.
  For example, in December 1999, following the denial of CanPRRI's charitable status application by Revenue Canada, Jaffer stood up in the House and verbally assaulted Neil Barkley, then head of Revenue Canada's Charities Directorate, nominating him as "the laziest civil servant in the federal government." Jaffer called on the Revenue Minister to direct the department to re-review CanPRRI's application.
  While serving as the Alliance's environment critic, Jaffer took up CanPRRI's position on the federal government's proposed Species At Risk Act (SARA) with gusto. An April 2000 policy briefing on the bill published in the Hill Times under Jaffer's name strongly resembled a CanPRRI report on the issue, with about one third of the article lifted word-for-word from the CanPRRI document. The report, titled "Endangered Species Protection: Lessons Canada Should Learn from the United States Endangered Species Act," was published in October 1997, and authored by the organization's then-managing director Danielle Smith and Robert Smith, an outspoken critic of the U.S. law who works at the Washington, D.C.-based Competitive Enterprise Institute.
  Johnston attended meetings with groups lobbying Jaffer on the species issue without disclosing his CanPRRI affiliation, although he did disclose this affiliation with one environmental group several days after a meeting with Jaffer, when Johnston called the group to request further information.
  Rahim Jaffer's office refused to answer questions about Johnston. When asked if Jaffer would respond to new developments beyond the incident involving the Vancouver radio station, a staff person in his office simply said, "there won't be any new developments," and refused to comment further.
  Calls to Matthew Johnston were not returned.

Sudden website alternations
  After questions were asked of others affiliated with CanPRRI, the organization took several documents off its web page, including the list of advisory board members, board of directors, and editorial board. Several press releases, and an audio file of Rahim Jaffer's statements in the House of Commons criticizing Revenue Canada for denying CanPRRI's charitable status, were also removed. The group's web designer confirmed that CanPRRI directed him to take these pages out, although he stated that he was "not at liberty to say" specifically who asked him to do so. Calling back later, he stated that he took the pages down because "people are harassing them; people are coming to their homes."
  (Those contacted for this article were only contacted at their places of work.)
  It is clear that Johnston wore several hats while in Jaffer's office. In the January 22, 2001 issue of the western Canada publication Report, Johnston is identified as the president of Teaching Liberty. In an article on the Liberals' "tough love" approach to western alienation, he is quoted as saying, "Tough love? I think it's great; I think it will help push Alberta out of confederation. The only way we're going to scale back the size and scope of government is by being an independent nation. I think the political culture of Alberta is conducive to a vision of limited government and individual freedom not shared by the rest of the country." He then added, "I don't want to leave the impression that I oppose or support the existing political efforts to secede. My goal is to work with others to build an intellectual movement."
  There is no corporate record or phone listing for Teaching Liberty Inc. in any jurisdiction in Canada.

Aaron Freeman is an Ottawa-based writer and a columnist with The Hill Times [www.thehilltimes.ca], Canada's parliamentary newspaper.

Posted: March 26, 2001

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