Conservative party speech writer Owen Lippert resigned his position after Liberal MP Bob Rae accused Stephen Harper of plagiarizing parts of a speech he delivered in Parliament in 2003 after the U.S. invaded Iraq, the Globe and Mail reported Oct. 1.
The Liberal party posted a side-by-side comparison on YouTube between Harper’s speech and Australia’s then-prime minister John Howard’s delivery two days earlier, using much of the same text.
Rae alleged the speech might have taken its cue from the White House, which was looking for of the Iraq war.
It’s troubling the Tories’ first reaction was to blow off the issue as outdated and sensationalist on the part of the Liberals.
Any issue of public interest should be addressed openly, and the Tories’ initial failure to do so suggests the party had something to hide or didn’t take its constituents’ concerns seriously.
For a party that touts itself as a defender of intellectual property and introduced a sweeping copyright reform bill in June, meant in part to prevent illegal ing, the Tories show little awareness of their own unethical actions.
People should be able to expect integrity from their leaders and it’s important to develop a standard by which to judge them.
But this is a difficult task.
Virtually all politicians rely heavily on speech writers to craft effective rhetoric, perhaps even more so during an election campaign.
The Conservatives aren’t the only ones to occasionally practice plagiarism; almost immediately after news of Harper’s antics leaked, media outlets were already drawing comparisons to Liberal leader Stéphane Dion’s environmental platform on his website in 2006, where he quoted the David Suzuki Foundation without attribution.
In 1988, Senator Joseph Biden, current Democratic vice-presidential candidate, was forced to drop out of the presidential race after he failed to credit parts of a speech he borrowed from British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock, a mistake he publicly acknowledged.
Harper’s faux pas, however, doesn’t appear to have ruffled his feathers.
Canada needs a standard by which to hold all politicians able for plagiarism.
Until that happens we’ll be left wondering whose words are coming out of their mouths.
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