I may post more on the Grewal tapes once I have time to read through all the transcripts (which appear to have been translated by Babelfish at first glance). For now I’ll simply state that the official Liberal line that “no offer was made” likely needs changing. Consider this bit from one of the transcripts, courtesy of Ujjal Dosanj:
As I said earlier, no Prime Minister would ever want to compromise himself with
that kind of appropriate because he want to be able to say “I did not make a
deak in it, there was no deal”
True enough. But consider this later line:
I’m sure rewards are there at some point, right. No one can forget such gestures
but they require certain degree of deniability. [A big laugh] Right, you
understand thing.
So, my point is, saying that “no offer was made” is likely not the best line to use when the Minister of Health is on tape saying there needs to be “deniability” and then laughing. It’s abundantly clear after reading the transcripts that an unspoken offer was made.
Now, I’m still a little perplexed as to why this is any different than the deal struck with Belinda but everyone appears intent on making a big story out of it so it’s likely best if the Liberals come up with a better defense than the meek lines they’ve been using (Wells comments on their other “Grewal wouldn’t take no for an answer” line at his site).