Media reports say top Conservative cabinet ministers met publicly with senior staff from KPMG's tax division, and one went so far as to promote the firm, even as the Canada Revenue Agency was alleging the company set up an offshore tax "sham" that deceived the government and deprived the treasury of potentially millions of dollars.
The reports say Revenue Minister Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Finance Minister Joe Oliver and Prime Minister Stephen Harper all appeared in public with officials from KPMG's tax department in 2014 and 2015 during the period when CRA auditors were continuing an investigation into one of the accounting firm's tax schemes and seeking names of multimillionaire clients.
KPMG also sponsored Oliver's 2015 post-budget speech in Vancouver. And in August 2014, KPMG executives registered to lobby the prime minister and his staff.
The CRA has alleged in court documents that the KPMG tax dodge — which involved clients with a minimum of $5 million setting up shell companies in the Isle of Man — was "intended to deceive" authorities.
KPMG has been fighting a February 2013 court order to hand over the list of wealthy clients to the CRA for more than two years.
Yet in the 31 months since the judicial authorization, neither the federal government nor KPMG has requested a court date for the accounting firm's appeal.
