BREAKING NEWS:
The Saskatchewan NDP has released a 16-year-old videotape featuring Premier Brad Wall and Tory MP Tom Lukiwski that it says contains sexist, racist and homophobic comments.
In particular, the NDP said Mr. Lukiwski made “hateful” remarks on the 1991 tape shot at the Conservative Party headquarters following a leader's debate, while Mr. Wall reportedly made inappropriate ethnic comments.
“Why would you videotape this, why would you keep it and why would you leave it behind?” NDP deputy leader Pat Atkinson said at a press conference Thursday.
“We decided that given Mr. Lukiwski's comments – he's a member of Parliament representing the people of our province in Ottawa – that the comments were so troubling and so disturbing that people needed to know what he had said,” she said.
Those comments include a homophobic diatribe, said NDP MP Bill Siksay, who repeated them during Question Period.
Mr. Siksay told the House of Commons Thursday that Mr. Lukiwski “allegedly states on the tape, ‘Let me put it to you this way. There's A's and B's. The A's are guys like me. The B's are homosexual faggots with dirt in their fingernails that transmit diseases.' ”
In response, Government House Leader Peter Van Loan said he was unfamiliar with the videotape but would take the matter seriously.
“The comments do sound distressing and inappropriate and they will have due attention,” Mr. Van Loan said.
There was no immediate comment from Mr. Lukiwski. A spokeswoman at Mr. Wall's office told globeandmail.com the Premier was not able to respond immediately to the allegations.
"We're just now reviewing the tape," said Bonny Braden. "We just got a copy a few minutes ago."
The New Democrats say they found the tape in a camera case when they moved into Opposition offices after Mr. Wall's Saskatchewan Party won last fall's provincial election.
Mr. Lukiwski was a Tory organizer at the time and Mr. Wall was a ministerial aide.
Ms. Atkinson said the pair are heard on tape ridiculing Roy Romanow, who defeated the provincial Tories in the 1991 election. “They're done in the context of Mr. Romanow and his descent, his ethnic background,” Ms. Atkinson said.
“I would say that he is using an immigrant accent of some kind and he is referring in the end to Mr. Romanow ... There are those of us who grew up at a time when in the province of Saskatchewan negative things were said about people of Eastern European background and they were hurtful things,” she added.
Ms. Atkinson also said there were inappropriate remarks about the gender of the provincial Liberal leader at the time, Lynda Haverstock.
More to come...
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