The Kingdom

The Kingdom is Ottawa. It is a city I know very well; both from having attended Carleton University as an undergraduate, working for companies in the city, and later traveling to meet federal ministers and Indian Affairs officials as a Government of the Northwest Territories official and later a management consultant.

The scene describes Ottawa at Christmas time.  The two men are very different: Hugh is a successful Calgary lawyer who has taken the position of deputy minister of Indian Affairs to help out a friend who sits in cabinet – he has no intension of staying longer than a year; and Francois a seasoned bureaucrat, the assistant deputy minister, who knows every nook and granny in the government. He is a man who ‘fixes’ problems.

What follows is an excerpt from Part 3, Chapter 4, where both men discuss the situation in the Grayson district and the report that two district Indian Affairs officials beat up an Indian chief.

(1)

It was near Christmas and the ice on the Rideau Canal had formed. Passersby stopped to watch a couple skating as though they were highly trained professionals in the Ice Capades. People were bundled tightly in winter coats, tuques, scarves, and boots. There was even the odd beaver hat and wool knitted hat from the Northwest Territories. Christmas carols blared from outdoor speakers, men dressed like Santa Clause stood beside Salvation Army kettles ringing bells, and the CBC reporters stood outside the parliament buildings waiting to interview politicians. No one paid much attention to the homeless crowding the tunnel across from the Chateau Laurier, the prostitutes in the Market, and least of all two government officials walking beside the Rideau Canal and sipping coffee.

The two men took their time. They walked slowly and talked quietly, each man listened to the other and each sipped a coffee laced with sugar and cream. Before leaving headquarters on Laurier. Hugh had said, “The office is a trap, François. I can’t get anything done without being interrupted. I have no time to think.” It was the reason they had left the office and driven over to the new headquarters under construction in the Terrasses de la Chaudière. “Let’s go,” Hugh had said; François followed him out the door, down the stairs, into the parking lot, and into Hugh’s Volvo. Hugh drove the short distance over the bridge to Hull, where they parked and inspected the building. Both men asked the construction supervisor a number of questions. François knew Robert Campeau, the developer, and felt obliged to let the supervisor know that he was well connected. They drove back, parked the car, bought coffee, and began to walk. It would soon be five o’clock and the office on Laurier would be empty – except for Hugh, François, and a half-dozen staff who stayed behind to work long into the evening making phone calls. Hugh might run off to brief the minister – a former insurance broker more interested in drinking and chasing women than introducing new policies.

François was a dark, handsome, highly educated government official; a French-Canadian with no hint of an accent and no need to apologize to anyone for using either of the official languages poorly. He was a man who believed strongly in the policy of a bilingual civil service and had for as long as the policy existed. Prime Minister Trudeau was a great force for change in Canada, and Quebec could do no better than to have one of its own in charge. François was also a wine expert, an oenologist, who could speak knowledgeably on the soil and grapes of the great vineyards in France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and more recently, California. In the dark, cool basement of his home in the Gatineau Hills, he stored a thousand bottles of wine.

He also enjoyed riding horses – a hobby his girlfriend, a researcher in the department, had introduced him to. “If I had known the freedom of riding a horse, the joy that a horse can give, I would have taken up the practice a long time ago,” he thought. His wife, a cardiologist, had no interest in horses, although she enjoyed a glass or two of wine, as did his children, one at Princeton studying medicine and another in Paris studying philosophy. He would see them both at Christmas.

Hugh had no interest in wines or horses or girlfriends. He was a hard-nosed Calgary lawyer with a background in negotiating land claims and resource development agreements. He had worked with Indians in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and more recently, the Inuvialuit in the Northwest Territories. It was for this reason that his cabinet friend had asked him to take the position of deputy minister. “I’ll give you one year to get the department into shape and then I’m gone,” Hugh had said. But now it seemed that a year was not long enough.

When he first started, a senior Treasury Board official had told Hugh what to expect: “The department is riddled with dead weight, fools, and people who can barely tie their own shoelaces. The minister can never stay away from a bottle or a woman – on trips across the country, he offers himself shamelessly to women in bars, conferences, meetings, even on elevators. He’s an embarrassment to the government, but there you have it. The department is cursed and there’s no way to change anything except to tear it down. I’m telling you this so hopefully you can bring in new people. God knows the Indians need it.”

They had just finished a long discussion on the need for a new Indian and Inuit employment and training program and the difficulty in obtaining approval. They had also discussed a rumour that a woman had complained to the police about the minister trying to assault her when François mentioned that he had received a memo from the Ontario regional director general. “I received a memo from Stewart yesterday asking for an investigation into the Grayson district. As you know, it’s going to be amalgamated into one of our super districts. It appears that two district officials may have been involved in beating up an Indian chief – no proof, mind you, but still very serious. There are also concerns that one of the officials has been taking bribes from an air charter company. Moreover, a Catholic nun recently wrote a letter to Stewart making all sorts of accusations. He wants us to appoint an inspector to look into the matter.”

“François, this is precisely the sort of stuff that brought me out here.”

François nodded his head. “Yes, I know, Hugh. If it is true, it is very serious. If the media gets wind of this, it could hurt the department terribly.”

“What does Stewart want us to do?”

“He recommends we send someone with audit experience to look into all the issues, then write a report letting us know what he discovered and what we should do. I know it draws things out, but maybe that’s what we need. An experienced professional with a fresh set of eyes.”

“What about the police – shouldn’t they be involved in determining if district officials beat up an Indian chief? I mean, if this was Alberta, I can tell you that the police would be doing their job. I don’t think the Bloods or Blackfeet would take this lightly.”

“The chief is Ojibwa, from a remote village named Otter Falls. I wouldn’t worry about any protest. I also think we have to keep this in perspective. There is no proof that the officials in question did anything wrong, so we have to be discreet. We don’t want this thing blown up out of all proposition or, God forbid, getting out to the media. If it ever got out that two Indian Affairs officials beat up a chief, you can just imagine what it would to the department’s reputation. The issue of bribes is another matter, and we can easily handle that sort of thing.”

“So, we look for an auditor?”

“At this point, yes. After all, it’s not a criminal matter, at least not yet – and I don’t think we want to raise it to that level, at least not now, and hopefully never. If they are guilty of taking bribes, we can arrange for their transfer to another district, or buy them out, which is often the best option. We have enough issues without adding more to our plate.”