The political staffer at the centre of the Liberal roadwork email controversy is a recent convert to the party who worked for a Progressive Conservative MLA as recently as last year.

Ian Pelkey, the executive assistant to rookie Liberal cabinet minister Cathy Rogers, was a constituency assistant to Tory MLA Wes McLean from July 2012 to July 2013, according to his LinkedIn profile.

He also worked on McLean’s 2010 election campaign in the riding of Victoria-Tobique.

But it appears based on his LinkedIn profile that he switched his party affiliation to the Liberals in the late summer or early fall of 2013, while a student at Crandall University in Moncton.

Ian Pelkey is the executive assistant to Social Development Minister Cathy Rogers. He sent a controversial email this week about paving contracts. (LinkedIn) That’s where Rogers taught sociology before becoming a Liberal MLA and minister of Social Development after the Sept. 22 election. MLA

Pelkey became treasurer of the Moncton South Liberal association in November 2013. Rogers was nominated as the Liberal candidate in the riding a month later.

Rogers has not responded to interview requests from CBC News about an email released Monday by the PC opposition.

The email, by the Liberal riding association president in Riverview to other members of the riding executive, says Pelkey “has enquired if we are aware of any Liberal companies or individuals in Riverview that may wish to bid” on government road contracts.

McLean refused to discuss Pelkey with CBC News, except to say he’s “a good guy.” Pelkey himself has not responded to interview requests.

He describes himself on LinkedIn as “a recent business graduate with a fair amount” of experience in management, marketing, and public relations.

“I truly live by RFK’s quote, `Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly,’” he says on his profile.

Now Pelkey has given the opposition PCs ammunition to attack the Gallant government with accusations it plans to dispense millions of taxpayer dollars to Liberal-friendly road construction companies.

Pelkey contacted Liberal riding president

In the email passing on Pelkey’s request to local Liberals, Myer Rabin, the Liberal riding president in Riverview, writes that it is “the usual practice that upon a change of government, road work contracts are made available to supporters of the government in power.”

Opposition Leader Bruce Fitch leaked an email on Wednesday from Myer Rabin, which suggests the Liberals are looking for friendly companies to apply for road contracts. (Jacques Poitras/CBC) Rabin said Thursday in an interview that Pelkey’s point was simply to ensure Liberal-friendly firms were aware of available contracts so they could bid as part of the normal process. Pelkey’s

“His discussion with me was simply on the basis of, ‘We want to make these opportunities available to these people,’” he said.

Rabin says that was because the previous PC government excluded firms that were seen as Liberal. “The old government cut these people off from being eligible for these contracts,” he says.

Based on his conversation with Pelkey, he says contracts awarded by the Gallant Liberals will be “not on any basis other than merit. … I don’t ascribe any intent to [Pelkey] other than that.”

Rabin says he has “no idea” whether Pelkey was acting on his own, or had been directed to seek out Liberal companies from someone higher up in the Gallant government.

On Wednesday, Gallant initially said there was little way to control what a Liberal “volunteer” wrote in an email, a reference to Rabin.

Premier Brian Gallant distanced himself from the road work patronage cited in the leaked email. (James West/Canadian Press) He said the suggestion that the idea originated with Pelkey , a government employee, was “hypothetical.” Pelkey

But the premier then added that he would “make it clear to people who are working with us that this type of message, this type of behaviour is not what we're about.”

Rabin said he doesn’t know whether Pelkey had contacted the presidents of other Liberal riding associations. “He knows I’m the president of Riverview, and I’m the guy to contact.”

Rabin says he has not heard from any other executive assistants to other Liberal ministers.

Executive assistants ‘philosophically compatible”

Executive assistants to ministers play a largely undefined role in politics.

They generally have two main functions: to help a minister do his or her cabinet job within a department and with the government caucus, and to help a minister with constituency files.

Pelkey worked for former Tory MLA Wes McLean. (CBC) “An executive assistant is going to assist the minister in the handling of their duties and work with those caucus members who have files that relate to that minister’s responsibilities,” says former PC MLA Wes McLean. MLAWes

Technically, assistants are not supposed to do party tasks while drawing their taxpayer-funded salary during working hours.

But the role is politically “exempt,” meaning executive assistants don’t go through the normal civil service hiring process.

Gallant’s public safety minister, Stephen Horsman, for example, has hired two political assistants, Randy McKeen and Sheri Shannon, who were Liberal candidates in the September provincial election.

Executive assistants don’t have job security when the government changes, either.

Nor are executive assistants banned from partisan political activity the way regular civil servants are.

“Most executive assistants are active in the party they’re serving,” McLean says.

“It’s important to be philosophically compatible with the minister you serve and with the government that the minister serves.”

The exemption from normal civil service rules allows executive assistants to continue taking part in party events. Pelkey’s LinkedIn profile says he is still the treasurer of the Moncton South Liberal riding association and the director of finance for the New Brunswick Young Liberal Association.

And even if Rabin’s benign explanation of his email is true, Pelkey clearly felt it was within his responsibilities to gather the names of Liberal-friendly road construction companies.

Long history of political road work

This isn’t the first time a government has been accused of politicizing road work: in fact, it is an issue that comes up over and over in New Brunswick politics.

That’s despite the existence of the New Brunswick Opportunities Network, an online tendering system that, in theory, is supposed to give potential bidders equal access to government contracts.

In 2013, Jimmy Bourque, an executive assistant to PC cabinet minister Paul Robichaud, admitted he was in a conflict of interest because a company he owned was renting road construction equipment to the Department of Transportation. (CBC) In 2011, the Liberals, then in opposition, obtained an e-mail by PC MLA Jake Stewart in which he said he was “not liking the names” of companies being considered for a Department of Transportation contract in his Southwest Miramichi riding.

And in 2013, Jimmy Bourque, an executive assistant to PC cabinet minister Paul Robichaud, admitted he was in a conflict of interest because a company he owned was renting road construction equipment to the Department of Transportation.

The Liberals also often accused the PCs of choosing road projects based on whether the riding was represented by a Tory MLA.

Rabin says the Alward government also prevented Liberal-friendly firms from bidding on contracts, an exclusion Pelkey wanted to redress.

“All I know is in the past, some people in Riverview weren’t advised of contracts until it was too late,” he says.

Rabin said, however, that he did not know the names of any such people.

Rabin’s email calls it “the usual practice” for road contracts to go to supporters of the government in power, whoever it may be.

On Wednesday, PC leader Bruce Fitch said that was incorrect, but he choose his words carefully, limiting his comments to his own experience as a cabinet minister.

“It might be the usual practice for Liberals, but I know under, uh, my watch as a minister, I never directed my staff to send something like that out. Nor did any of my party presidents that I’m aware of send information like that out.”