Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard denied on Wednesday that he demoted his transport minister for flagging irregularities in the Transportation Department regarding public contracts, cost overruns and employee intimidation.
Couillard said he demoted Robert Poeti in January in order to make room in his cabinet for more women and young people.
The premier added he was never made aware of Poeti's findings when the latter was running the Transportation Department.
Quebec's L'actualite magazine reported that Poeti had discovered transport employees tasked with reviewing public contracts were being intimidated and that embarrassing cost overruns on public projects were hidden using accounting tricks.
The magazine also reported that former employees were given no-bid contracts worth slightly under $25,000, which is the legal limit that triggers a call for tenders.
Poeti told reporters that when he was minister, he hired an external analyst to look into the way the department was being run.
He said he was told "certain employees received threats and were being intimidated regarding certain public contracts and that was unacceptable."
Poeti said he believed Couillard regarding the premier's claim he was demoted to make the provincial cabinet more diverse.
He added, however, that he would have liked to stay on as transport minister to clean up the department.
Francois Legault, leader of Coalition for Quebec's Future, said if the reports are true it's "completely unacceptable and it shows that the cleanup of the department was not done -- not in the way contracts are verified or regarding accounting practices."
Couillard said in the legislature that the provincial police's anti-corruption unit has been made aware of the allegations and added that he had full confidence in the new transport minister, Jacques Daoust.
