A leading democracy watchdog is filing an ethics complaint against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in relation to the SNC-Lavalin fiasco, the Sun has learned.

Democracy Watch, a Canadian advocacy group, believes Trudeau broke two sections of the Conflict of Interest Act by failing to abstain from a vote held last week in the House of Commons over whether or not to hold a public inquiry into the growing scandal. The Liberals defeated the motion with 159 against and 133 in favour.

“Jody Wilson-Raybould did the right thing by abstaining,” Duff Conacher, co-founder of Democracy Watch and adjunct professor of law and politics at the University of Ottawa, told the Sun. “Democracy Watch will soon file a complaint with the Ethics Commissioner about Trudeau’s vote.”

If Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion takes on the case, this would be in addition to the investigation he is already undertaking in response to complaints by the NDP about the broader concerns around political interference in the prosecution of SNC-Lavalin.

The first section Democracy Watch believes Trudeau violated, subsection 6(2), states that: “No minister of the Crown, minister of state or parliamentary secretary shall, in his or her capacity as a member of the Senate or the House of Commons, debate or vote on a question that would place him or her in a conflict of interest.”

The second, section 21, states: “A public office holder shall recuse himself or herself from any discussion, decision, debate or vote on any matter in respect of which he or she would be in a conflict of interest.”

If found guilty, it would not be the first time for Trudeau. In December 2017, Trudeau became the first sitting prime minister to have been found guilty of breaking federal conflict of interest rules, in relation to his Bahamas vacation to the Aga Khan’s island.