The CRA tells employees “break the law”

Whether it be counselling their employees to commit perjury, human rights abuses, acts of harassment towards female employees of the Montreal Tax Service Office, sexual harassment of a terminated female employee of the Montreal TSO, even physical assault of another female employee of that same TSO… the CRA has no limits to what it is willing to do to to win at all costs.

The CRA regularly provides RCMP with taxpayer information, despite assurances that taxpayer information is held in the strictest confidentiality. Even ignoring the fact that sharing information with the RCMP is, in most cases, against the law.

So we were really not very surprised when the letter above was circulated to several employees of the CRA. The CRA is now counselling employees to ignore section 241, break the law and speak to the RCMP; even though doing so could result in termination of the employee or even criminal charges. It looks like the CRA will search to the lowest end of the gene pool to find an employee that would be willing to sign such a letter.

Additionally, some union stewards actually told union members that they had no choice but to cooperate with the RCMP. Imagine that, unlike other Canadians, (even murderers, drug dealers, and rapists, politicians included) a CRA employee does not have the right against self-incrimination guaranteed by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom (remember that fact the next time you renew your contract).

Instead of counselling employees on breaking the law, maybe employees should be counselled on their rights when being questioned by the RCMP, or CRA internal investigators who immediately turns over what’s been told to them to the RCMP.

As for taxpayer information being shared with the police. We just had to laugh when we saw the article below. Trust us the police and the CRA collaborate on files all the time. When you send in your tax return you might as well send a copy to the RCMP, because audit findings are regularly shared with police; in fact, the RCMP share an office (in the Montreal burrow of Nun’s Island) along with several members of the CRA’s Montreal Tax Service Office Special Investigations unit. And you can be sure that if it’s happening in Montreal, it’s happening all over Canada.

Roughly 15 years ago, when the union brought up the subject of Special Investigation employees giving information to the RCMP (to the then head of the Montreal Special Investigations department), they were told that he was aware of what was going on, he had warned the employees involved, and as far as he was concerned - if the news ever got out, would deny any knowledge of the illegal sharing of information that was going on, and the employees involved were on their own because he could not protect them.

Even more interesting, when the illegal criminal investigation of the Italian employees of the Montreal TSO began in 2006, the now retired employee leading the investigation was housed by the RCMP in Nun’s Island. Oddly enough that employee was, at one time accused of using the CRA database, for his own personal gain, that employee even had the Sûreté du Québec conduct a search in his home for evidence. That said, today, the CRA employ a person who was convicted of the gang rape of a minor! This fact was and is well known at the highest levels of management in Montreal (both CRA and RCMP); however nothing is done about rectifying the situation because that employee is not part of the ‘ethnic community’ that is so despised in the Montreal.

Furthermore, the RCMP will often use the CRA to do what it can’t do directly, even though they’re not allowed to do so. In investigating the former employees of the Montreal TSO, the RCMP got CRA employees to consult FINTRAC “Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada”, even though FINTRAC’s records are barred except in drug trafficking, money laundering, and terrorism cases. Additionally the RCMP got CRA employees to give them information which they directly could not get without first getting a warrant.

Finally, we have documentary evidence that the RCMP have used the news media illegally, providing them with leaked (and sometimes false) information, and we have strong circumstantial evidence that the CRA has done the same (ex-employees and private taxpayers). RCMP, CRA and the news media working a file together.

Next time the CRA comes to audit you, you might be told that you are under audit, but you won’t know for sure if it’s really an audit or is it a criminal investigation disguised as an audit. Maybe you should just refuse to be audited…