EDITORIAL – Caputo’s email fracas with Lametti is much ado about nothing

An editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

THICK SKINS are a prerequisite for politicians but sometimes they’re in surprisingly short supply.

Monday and Tuesday, Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo MP Frank Caputo, a Conservative, got into a public dust-up with federal Attorney-General and Justice Minister David Lametti over an email Lametti sent him.

It came after Caputo applauded a speech by a fellow Conservative MP on the David Johnston issue. The speech included a remark about the impartiality, or supposed lack of it, of highly regarded former Supreme Court Justice Frank Iacobucci, who had given Johnston advice on impartiality in the election interference probe.

“I see you clapping on attacks on Frank Icoubbi’s Integrity (sic),” the email read. “I will let the community know.”

Caputo, a lawyer, thinking it was a reference to the legal community, raised a point of privilege with the Speaker. He saw it as a threat. Lametti, in reply, explained he was talking about the Italian community, not the legal community.

Was that inappropriate, too? Lametti, Iacobucci and Caputo are all Italian, so I think we can give Lametti a pass on that one.

Caputo, however, quickly changed gears and decried the email as a reference to his “cultural community,” and insisted it wasn’t any better than if it had been about the legal community.

He would not, he grandly proclaimed, be “intimidated” from doing his job as MP. It was all a bit melodramatic and hardly worth all the manufactured excitement.

So, let’s break it down. Maybe Lametti needs to be clear about which community he’s talking to when he sends emails to opposition MPs. Maybe he just shouldn’t send them at all.

But maybe Caputo should be more careful about which parts of a speech he applauds. Maybe he needs to not take himself so seriously.

Politics is not a kind and gentle game. It’s rough and tumble. It’s often much ado about nothing.

That’s very much what this disputed email was.

I’m Mel Rothenburger, the Armchair Mayor.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.