Premier Kathleen Wynne and her deputy chief of staff, Pat Sorbara, will be questioned by Ontario Provincial Police investigating allegations of bribery in last week’s Sudbury byelection.

That news comes as OPP criminal investigators are stepping up a separate probe of the Liberals in the $1.1-billion gas plants scandal due to intense interest in the 20-month-old case.

Wynne’s office confirmed she and Sorbara will meet with detectives amid allegations her deputy chief and Sudbury Liberal organizer Gerry Lougheed illegally offered Andrew Olivier a job to step aside for preferred candidate Glenn Thibeault, the city’s defecting New Democrat MP.

“A time has yet to be confirmed,” said Wynne spokeswoman Zita Astravas. The premier’s schedule has her on private time this week before the legislature begins its winter session next Tuesday.

Police would not reveal who is on their list for questioning “in order to protect the integrity of the investigation,” Det.-Supt. Dave Truax, director of criminal investigation services, said in an email.

Thibeault won the riding, with the NDP in second and Olivier placing third as an independent.

The OPP allege Sorbara, one of Wynne’s most trusted aides, and Lougheed illegally coerced Olivier — in calls he recorded with his smartphone because he is a quadriplegic and cannot take notes — to step aside.

There’s no indication that Wynne offered Olivier a job in a separate call that was not taped.

Deputy premier Deb Matthews stressed “any suggestion that anything was offered in exchange for any action is false.”

“We take it very seriously. We’re co-operating fully, but the allegation is false allegation,” Matthews said, noting that, coincidentally, contract negotiations have just begun between the government and the OPP.

“It’s very important that negotiations with the OPP happen . . . independent of any investigation,” she said.

Sorbara did not respond to queries, while Lougheed, a businessman, told the Star he is “not at liberty” to discuss whether he’s been interviewed by police.

But he vowed to remain as chair of the Sudbury police services board “unless there’s something found that I’ve done wrong.”

At the same time, Wynne’s office is dealing with fallout from the investigation into deleted emails in the gas plants scandal.

“We recognize there is a real public interest in getting this thing finished,” said OPP Supt. Paul Beesley.

Beesley said the investigation into the deleted emails is complex, with detectives going through countless emails and last week securing a court order to do a forensic examination of the BlackBerry of former premier Dalton McGuinty’s chief of staff, David Livingston, who is under investigation for breach of trust.

“We’ve got to make sure that we have dealt with all the evidence that is available to us. So we’ve just got to go down every sort of rabbit hole that comes up. It is taking quite a bit longer than we originally thought it would.”

Police allege Livingston obtained a special computer password allowing Peter Faist, a computer expert and spouse of former McGuinty deputy chief of staff, Laura Miller, to wipe clean computer hard drives in the premier’s office before Wynne took power.

Faist has been co-operating with police, supplying emails that have aided their investigation. He, Miller and Livingston have denied any wrongdoing. No charges have been laid and police allegations have not been proven in court.

“I am thinking of wrapping this up as quickly as the evidence allows us to do,” Beesley said, depending on what is gleaned from Livingston’s smart phone, 21 hard drives previously seized and email tapes from Livingston and Miller secured with a court order late last year.

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Police have had Livingston’s BlackBerry since June 2013 but required court approval to obtain information from it. Det.-Const. André Duval said in court documents made public last week he thinks Livingston used his BlackBerry so communications would not be on government servers, using programs like BlackBerry Messenger or text messages, and not available to freedom of information requests.

“I believe that one of the reasons investigators were unable to locate messages concerning the gas plants or government records management is that communications related to those issues were often conducted offline and through the assistance of a government-issued BlackBerry,” Duval wrote.

Meanwhile, a third OPP investigation has been going on for three years into dubious business practices at the province’s ORNGE air ambulance service — with no end or charges in sight.

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