Luc Lavoie, who was a spokesperson for prime minister Brian Mulroney, waits to testify before the Commons ethics committee on Parliament Hill in Ottawa in February, 2008.CHRIS WATTIE/Reuters
For decades, Luc Lavoie epitomized the chain-smoking, hard-living crisis manager who travelled the world to put out fires for his political and business clients.
In a new book coming out on Tuesday, Mr. Lavoie lifts the veil on some of the most controversial files he has ever managed: his fight to help Pierre Karl Péladeau's company enter the Canadian cellphone market; the drama behind Lucien Bouchard's exit from the Progressive Conservative government in 1990; and the infamous Airbus affair.
Mr. Lavoie offers unique insight into the larger-than-life personalities for whom he worked. Still, he keeps some secrets to himself, feeling confidentiality was an integral part of his work for the likes of former prime minister Brian Mulroney.
"My guiding principle, which I have raised to the level of cardinal virtue and which has always guided me in my personal as well as my professional life, has been loyalty," says the 62-year-old Mr. Lavoie in En Première Ligne (On The Front Line).
The book goes deep into Mr. Lavoie's role in defending Mr. Mulroney against allegations that he received kickbacks as part of Air Canada's $1.8-billion purchase of Airbus jets. However, Mr. Lavoie does not directly mention the revelation that German-Canadian businessman Karlheinz Schreiber had given $225,000 in cash to Mr. Mulroney after he had left office in 1993.
This loyalty has earned Mr. Lavoie the eternal trust of his friends. He is one of the few people who managed to remain close over the years to both Mr. Mulroney and Mr. Bouchard, two former "blood brothers" who famously split over the failed Meech Lake Accord.
Hailing from eastern Quebec, Mr. Lavoie landed in Ottawa in 1976 as a 21-year-old deep-voiced radio reporter who only spoke French.
He went on to travel the world for work. At one point in 1980, he capped off a night of bar hopping in Senegal with a stop at a large Mourides brotherhood meeting. Picking up a baby in what he thought was a friendly gesture, Mr. Lavoie recounts how it quickly became assumed he had acquired the child. An ever-angrier crowd prevented him from giving the child back to his mother. He was forced to bring the baby back to his hotel room and relied on the Canadian embassy to relieve him of his new-found responsibilities.
In 1986, Mr. Lavoie jumped the fence into the world of politics. Within two years, he was working in the Prime Minister's Office, helping Mr. Bouchard's entry into federal politics. A law-school colleague of Mr. Mulroney, Mr. Bouchard was a key element of the Progressive Conservative government's strategy in Quebec in the 1988 general election.
But Mr. Lavoie says relations between the pair became increasingly stormy in the lead-up to Mr. Bouchard's dramatic exit from the government just before the death of the Meech Lake Accord in 1990. At one point, Mr. Mulroney asked Mr. Lavoie whether Mr. Bouchard had a drinking problem. Mr. Lavoie then relayed the question to Mr. Bouchard, who responded with one of his epic outbursts of anger, Mr. Lavoie says.
Mr. Lavoie was stuck between a rock and a hard place as he remained in touch with both men over the years. On a number of occasions, Mr. Mulroney tried to get Mr. Lavoie to accuse Mr. Bouchard of "treason." Still, in a footnote in his book, Mr. Lavoie says he has just learned that Mr. Mulroney and Mr. Bouchard recently talked after more than two decades.
Mr. Lavoie owes much of his national profile to his role as the public face of Mr. Mulroney's defence team in the Airbus affair. He says he came on board after Mr. Mulroney had assembled a team of lawyers to fight the allegations of corruption in a letter sent to Swiss authorities. Mr. Lavoie says his immediate instinct was to treat the matter as a political rather than legal problem, pushing his team to sue the government over the defamatory letter.
"The lawyers were calling for a $1-million lawsuit; I was pushing for $100-million. The lawyers were thinking about what would happen at trial. I kept telling them there wouldn't be a trial," Mr. Lavoie recounts. The lawsuit ended up being for $50-million, with the matter eventually settled out of court. Mr. Mulroney received $2.1-million from the federal government to cover his legal fees – and Mr. Lavoie's communications work.
In 2000, Mr. Lavoie started a 12-year-long association with Mr. Péladeau, the head of Québecor Inc. which had just purchased cable company Vidéotron Ltd. Mr. Lavoie said that over the years, he developed a friendship with Mr. Péladeau, the former PQ leader who is mulling the possibility of returning to politics one day. Mr. Lavoie, however, believes Mr. Péladeau is not suited for the job.
"I have told him that if there is one person who is not cut out for politics, it's him. I did not see him at the time – nor do I seem him today – in a world of perpetual compromises where one must always put water in his wine," Mr. Lavoie says.