Jerry Dias — the national president of Canada’s biggest private sector union and one of the more outspoken critics of the Harper government — donated $300 in June to the Kellie Leitch Conservative leadership campaign.

According to Elections Canada data, a donation from Jerome P. Dias of Milton, Ontario was received on June 15, 2016, months after Leitch launched her campaign — but months before she announced her controversial plan to screen immigrants and refugees for so-called “Canadian values”.

Unifor director of communications Denise Hammond confirmed in an email that Dias and Leitch are friends, and that the donation was “personal”.

“Jerry Dias and Kelly Leitch are personal friends and he made a contribution to her campaign. This was a personal donation and not a single cent was donated from or on behalf of the union,” she wrote.

When Unifor was founded in late August 2013 — a merger of the Canadian Auto Workers union and the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada — Leitch, then labour minister, reached out to Dias “to congratulate him and discuss ways of working together to improve job opportunities”, the Canadian Press reported.

In September 2014, according to a Unifor press release, the two participated in the ‘Hope in High Heels’ walk to raise awareness of violence against women.

“Dr. Leitch and I have significant political debate, and still I enjoy working with the minister and respect her commitment to our community,” Dias was quoted as saying. “As a constituent and colleague, I was thrilled to hear that Minister Leitch will be joining us this Saturday. We must all stand shoulder to shoulder in the fight to end violence against women, here in Canada and around the world.”

Despite his friendship with Leitch, however, Dias was one the Harper government’s harshest critics.

Writing in the Huffington Post in July, Dias said he hoped “in the coming years the Harper legacy will … amount to Canadian voters remembering what Harper tried to do to this country, and vow(ing) never to make the same mistake again.”

Though perhaps not as much of an eyebrow-raiser as the Dias donation, it’s also noteworthy that former Liberal MP and leadership candidate Martha Hall Findlay — now president and CEO of the Canada West Foundation — gave $199.00 to Michael Chong’s campaign in July.