OTTAWA–The growing concentration of power in the Prime Minister's Office must be challenged because it is threatening the very democracy that Canadians enjoy, retired Justice John Gomery says.

The man who investigated the Liberal sponsorship scandal used his time yesterday before a Commons committee to criticize the Conservative government for not implementing a key recommendation from his second report.

That recommendation called for power to be taken out of the hands of the scores of unelected and unaccountable people working in the PMO.

Gomery told the government operations committee that the PMO, in recent years, has grown rapidly and "they have the ear of the most important and powerful person in Canadian government."

"I suggest this trend is a danger to Canadian democracy and leaves the door wide open to the kind of political interference in the day-to-day administration of government programs that led to what is commonly called the sponsorship scandal," he said.

Critics have continually accused Harper of running a very centrally controlled and secretive government and point to his lack of accessibility to the media and his iron grip on the Conservative caucus as well as the bureaucracy.

"We have a government where one man seems to have an ever-increasing influence upon what government policy is going to be. If you look back historically at prime ministers in the past, I don't think they had the same hold over their party and Parliament that the present prime minister has," Gomery told reporters later.

Liberal MP Garth Turner said yesterday he witnessed Harper's autocratic ways when he sat in the Conservative caucus before he was kicked out in the fall of 2006.

"Before the last election campaign, the Conservative party and the Conservative leader were making noises that parliamentary reform was an important part of it. But once the election was over, the idea was completely forgotten," Turner said.

"In the year I spent in caucus, members were absolutely told they could not speak to the media unless you get permission from Sandra Buckler (Harper's communications director). ... That's how extreme the censorship was."

Gomery told the committee that too many people in the PMO, and cabinet are more concerned about their loyalty to the Prime Minister than they are to Parliament.

"These people (in cabinet) owe their limousines to this individual ... so that all comes into play," he said.

Gomery, 75, headed up the commission that investigated the Liberal sponsorship scandal. The sponsorship program was designed to increase Ottawa's profile in Quebec after the narrow federalist victory in the 1995 sovereignty referendum.

The first of his two reports, filed in November 2005, found millions of sponsorship dollars were funnelled to Liberal-friendly advertising agencies.

The second report, in February 2006, offered 19 recommendations on how to restore government accountability. He expressly called for ways to limit political interference and rebalance power.

Gomery testified that the Conservative government has all but ignored the second report.

"I am disappointed. I find it hard to swallow," he told the Commons government operations committee, which is reviewing the Conservatives' handling of his report.

Gomery said when he recommended that the office and the role of the Clerk of the Privy Council be reviewed in terms of independence, it was rejected outright by Harper.

Among other things, the retired justice recommended that deputy ministers not be appointed by the prime minister but rather that the government adopt a system similar to Alberta's where there is a vetting process, which he says – for the most part – takes politics out senior appointments.

The Tory members of the committee reminded Gomery it was their government that brought in the Accountability Act. It was drafted by the Tories in response to the sponsorship scandal, passed the Commons and Senate and received royal assent in December 2006.

But a separate cabinet order is required for many provisions to come into force, which means, for example, there is nothing forcing cabinet to fulfil its promise to establish an appointments commission.

"I think the federal Accountability Act was certainly a step in the right direction, but it was not a response to my report," Gomery said.

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"My report hadn't even been filed ... in other words, the Accountability Act anticipated some of my recommendations. I think it did not anticipate the others and the others have been ignored," he said.

Gomery noted that he met with then-Treasury Board president John Baird, who seemed concerned the judge might cause trouble for the government. Baird, he said, appeared relieved that Gomery then still had two years left on the bench and therefore would be judicially gagged.