Quebec finally has a full-fledged public inquiry underway that potentially will have greater impact on politics in the province than the Gomery Commission. This new inquiry will delve into collusion to rig bids on public-sector construction contracts — and the results could be dramatic for both Premier Jean Charest’s Liberals and the Parti Québécois. Long-serving mayors in Montreal and Laval also are under scrutiny.

The Charbonneau Commission — headed by Justice France Charbonneau of the Quebec Superior Court, along with co-commissioners Roderick Macdonald, a respected McGill University law professor, and Renaud Lachance, Quebec’s outgoing auditor general — will look at provincial and municipal contracts, as well as work done for Hydro-Québec and other public entities.

The 15-year period of the commission’s probe dates back to 1996, which means deals done by PQ governments, as well as Charest’s Liberals, will be examined.

The involvement of organized crime and illegal funding of political parties, by criminals and legitimate businesses alike, also will be probed.

Calls for a public inquiry into corruption in Quebec’s construction sector date back to the spring of 2009, after disturbing investigative reports by Radio-Canada’s Enquête program had suggested Quebec taxpayers pay premiums as high as 30% on public-sector construction work.

And since that time, shoddy construction work has come to light in the form of crumbling bridges and overpasses.

Enquête had suggested some of Quebec’s biggest construction companies were involved, that organized crime played a role and that illegal cash and disguised payments were made to politicians. Charest had resisted widespread demands for an inquiry, instead funding police operations, which so far have not brought to justice any of the big names mentioned in the Enquête reports.

Finally, in response to a report by former Montreal police chief Jacques Duchesneau into collusion to rig bids on provincial transport department contracts, Charest named Charbonneau in October. But, initially, Charest did not give Charbonneau the powers of public inquiry.

Duchesneau had discovered “a clandestine and well-rooted universe of unsuspected scope” threatening Quebec society and concluded that a public inquiry was needed to root out systemic corruption.

Charest has given Charbonneau the power to invite witnesses to testify, without immunity and without subpoena powers, explaining that he did not want to undermine police work.

The premier has suggested that granting commission witnesses immunity in return for their testimony means they can not be prosecuted, a position challenged by Bernard Roy, chief prosecutor of the Gomery Commission. Roy notes the main Gomery witnesses were all convicted after they testified, using evidence that police gathered.

Finally, in early November, Charbonneau wrote to the premier, saying she needed the full powers of the Public Inquiries Act, which she was then granted.

Still, it could take Charbonneau and her team several months to complete their preliminary work, including closed hearings, before the public hearings begin.

During that period, Charest will deflect all Opposition queries about corruption, saying, “Let the commission do its work.”

And with the commission’s work out of the news, Charest could use that window to call a spring election.  IE