Daughter of late MP Chuck Cadman says RCMP have asked about allegations of bribe

Mounties confirm that they've received a letter from the Liberals asking them to look into the allegation. They are not calling it an investigation. "We received a letter from (a member of the Liberal party) requesting RCMP look into the allegations," said Sgt. Nathalie Deschenes.

"We have nothing further to say."

Deschenes would not comment on whether officers have spoken to those involved in the affair.

Jodi Cadman said RCMP spoke to her in mid-March, shortly after the allegations by Cadman's widow surfaced in a biography of the Independent MP.

She said the interview lasted about 90 minutes, during which officers asked her what her father told her on his deathbed.

"And where would they look (for proof of a bribe offer) if they were to look, that kind of thing. And I'm like, 'I have no idea.' So it was a lot of that," Jodi Cadman said Monday.

"They're just trying to find any link, any evidence to support anything."

She said Mounties have not spoken to her since then.

Her mother, Dona Cadman, did not return calls seeking comment Monday but she told the Toronto Star last week that she has been interviewed twice by investigators.

In the biography by author Tom Zytaruk, Like a Rock: The Chuck Cadman Story, the MP's widow said federal Conservatives operatives offered her dying husband a $1-million life-insurance policy.

Jodi Cadman said her father made a similar deathbed admission to her about the alleged offer.

A Conservative spokesman has said that two of Harper's close confidants, Doug Finley and Tom Flanagan, met with Cadman on May 19, 2005 - the day of an historic confidence vote in which the fate of Paul Martin's Liberal government rested squarely on the Independent MP's shoulders.

The party spokesman said they offered a repayable loan for Cadman's local riding association to cover campaign expenses if he rejoined the Tories.

Cadman ultimately sided with the Liberals in the confidence vote and kept then-prime minister Paul Martin in office for a few more months.

Harper told Dona Cadman that he did not know of any offer of an insurance policy.

He said in a taped interview with the biographer in September 2005 that there was an offer "only to replace financial considerations he might lose due to an election."

Harper did not explain further what "financial considerations" were involved.

Dona Cadman told the Toronto Star that she hopes RCMP get to the bottom of the affair.

"I hope eventually the RCMP will find out who offered what," said Cadman.

"Chuck never told me who they were. I'm in the dark as much as anyone else and it would be nice to know who these two people were. They could be just yahoos."