Cannon says he doesn't know how Tory ad-scheme money was doled out

Cannon is the latest, and most senior, of several Conservative nominees to profess ignorance about details of the so-called "in-and-out" scheme. The scheme is at the centre of an Elections Canada probe that culminated in a raid on party headquarters with help from the RCMP last month.

The elections agency alleges that Conservative advertising transactions allowed the party to spend more than $1 million over its legal campaign limit of $18 million.

Under the scheme, the party shifted money from its national office into - then quickly out of - 67 local ridings in a way that allegedly blurred the extent of its national ad spending.

The opposition contends the extra cash may have given the Tories the upper hand in the January 2006 election.

The Tories insist the ad-buying scheme was perfectly legal.

Further, the Conservatives argue much of the material seized during the raid should be off-limits to investigators - a claim that drew opposition barbs in the House of Commons on Friday.

"No more excuses. No more stonewalling. When will the government co-operate with the RCMP and Elections Canada?" said Liberal MP Mark Holland. "How many more police raids will it take before we get some answers?"

The Conservatives said Thursday that 17 boxes of documents, five envelopes and seven computer hard drives contain privileged legal advice and personal material that's irrelevant to the Elections Canada investigation.

Last year, the Tories filed a lawsuit in the Federal Court of Canada challenging the elections agency's interpretation of campaign law.

Cannon, one of more than five dozen Tory candidates who took part in the ad-buying program, received more than $6,000 from headquarters. Others got tens of thousands of dollars.

Cannon claimed no knowledge of decisions as to how the money was distributed.

"I do not know," he said following question period.

He added that the allocation formula would be disclosed in coming court proceedings.

The Liberals cited e-mails Friday, including one copied to Cannon, that surfaced in the supporting materials used to obtain the search warrant.

In the December 2005 message, Michael Donison, then-national executive director of the Conservatives, questions how two Quebec ridings could balk at participating in the ad-buying scheme.

"Why should they be allowed to just outright refuse?" he writes.

Tory MP Pierre Poilievre defended the transactions.

"Conservative candidates spent Conservative funds on Conservative ads," he said. "They got financial assistance from the national party to do so. Elections Canada found out about it. How? Because we told them, and why would we not? After all, it is legal and all parties do it."

Papers filed in Ontario Superior Court indicate the RCMP has been enlisted to sift through some of the computer files taken from the Tories' downtown Ottawa offices.

Cpl. Maurizio Rosa of the RCMP's Integrated Technological Crime Unit in Ottawa is to team up with Elections Canada investigators to "perform an analysis of the electronic documentation" seized from more than a dozen computers and digital servers.