Liberal Senator says allegations of coverup by Tory colleagues need to be probed

OTTAWA – A Liberal senator helping to review improper expense claims says his committee needs to look into allegations two of its own members were involved in a coverup deal.

Larry Campbell, a former Mountie, was responding to a CTV News report that alleged Conservative Senators David Tkachuk and Carolyn Stewart Olsen persuaded colleague Mike Duffy to conceal the details of a $90,000 expense repayment.

Tkachuk and Stewart Olsen both sit on the internal economy committee reviewing cases of inappropriate expense claims, as well as its powerful three-member steering committee.

Duffy received a clandestine $90,000 cheque from Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s chief of staff Nigel Wright last March to pay back the Senate for improper living expenses.

The CTV News report, paraphrasing emails shown to the agency by an anonymous source, said Tkachuk allegedly told Duffy that if he went along with Wright’s offer the Senate would go easy on the audit of his expenses.

Tkachuk’s office calls the report a complete fabrication, and that the conversations described did not occur.

Stewart Olsen did not respond to a request for comment.

Both senators have said in the past that they only learned of Wright’s $90,000 cheque after the matter appeared in the media.

Liberal Senate Leader James Cowan says the RCMP will get to the bottom of what exactly transpired behind the scenes.