To me it feels like Bill Morneau is being set up to take the bullet for Trudeau.
I listened to this program today:
https://www.cpac.ca/en/programs/in-committee-house-of-commons/episodes/90012427/It only added to my impression that the WE organization is pretty questionable. From the real estate holdings to the accusations of exploitation of young volunteers to the transfer of money between different arms of the organization, to the structure of the organization, it all seems ... odd. Jesse Brown talked about all of that stuff at some length to the House committee. Vivian Krause added some interesting bits (a long with some unsubstantiated speculation). Krause talked about WE's partnerships with large corporations, as well as their privacy policy which states that they can provide your data to 3rd parties.
The impression I get is that WE is basically a way to monetize "wokeness".
So Bill Morneau took a $100,000 vacation in 2017, during which he received $41,000 of freebies from WE which he didn't bother paying back until this week. And he has a daughter who works for WE, and another daughter whose book was promoted by WE. That's all pretty damaging, but is that the real end game? $41,000 is pocket-change for the Morneau family, isn't it? He could get his daughter a job with a few phone calls. It seems like none of this would be worth the trouble for a guy like Morneau.
Ditto the Trudeaus. It's not like any of them need the speaking fees that were paid to Margaret and Sasha. It's not like Sophie needs whatever perks her gig with WE provides. Aren't these people all quite wealthy? It seems odd to me that they'd stick their necks out for the comparatively modest speaking fees and travel perks WE provided.
All of this seems very unethical, but I'm baffled as to what the point is. For WE the point is obvious: if you make powerful friends, you can get powerful favors. But for Morneau and Justin, what's in it for them? For Trudeau, I am thinking that what he got out of it wasn't so much perks for his wife or money for his mom and brother, but rather a big stage. These guys were willing to treat Trudeau like a big rock star, and gave him a platform to promote his ideas and himself. Maybe that's how they got him hooked on their kool-aid.
-k