The political future of Solicitor General Lawrence MacAulay is still very uncertain. Ethics counsellor Howard Wilson met with Prime Minister Jean Chretien late Tuesday but had not completed his report on whether the cabinet minister broke government rules.

CTV News Staff

The political future of Solicitor General Lawrence MacAulay is still very uncertain. Ethics counsellor Howard Wilson met with Prime Minister Jean Chretien late Tuesday but had not completed his report on whether the cabinet minister broke government rules.

"The prime minister and Mr. Wilson met but Mr. Wilson has not completed his work," Jim Munson, a spokesman for the prime minister, said Tuesday.

Wilson has returned to Ottawa from a trip to Prince Edward Island last week. He is putting the finishing touches on his investigation surrounding a contract awarded to the P.E.I. accounting firm of one of MacAulay's friends. He has not said when he will complete the report.

However, Chretien is scheduled to leave for the francophonie summit in Lebanon Wednesday afternoon. He would have to get the report early Wednesday in order to have time to fire MacAulay -- if necessary -- and swear in his replacement.

CTV's Mike Duffy says Chretien will pick International Cooperation Minister Susan Whelan to replace MacAulay as Canada's top law enforcement official, if Wilson shows that MacAulay broke the government's ethical guidelines.

Chretien has said he will await Wilson's final report before deciding MacAulay's status in the federal cabinet.

MacAulay would move to the Liberal back benches and the P.E.I. spot in cabinet would be handed to Malpeque MP Wayne Easter, Duffy says.

The opposition accuses MacAulay of awarding an untendered $70,000 consulting contract to an accounting firm owned by one of MacAulay's friends, Everett Roche. Roche was MacAulay's personal agent in two federal elections. The deal was later extended to total $100,000.

The contract was properly tendered through a computer system known as ACAN, MacAulay said. But it's still not clear whether the contract met ACAN's strict criteria, which normally includes a contract limit of $25,000.

MacAulay has also been accused of awarding a second contract to Tim Banks, the P.E.I. Liberal Party president. Banks' firm APM Group received about $120,000 to manage a $4-million renovation of Charlottetown's Confederation Centre.

MacAulay has repeatedly said that he has followed Treasury Board guidelines for awarding contracts and that he's done nothing wrong.

MacAulay spent Tuesday in his home riding on P.E.I., where he made several public appearances.

Rumours of MacAulay's possible departure from cabinet intensified Monday when he was absent from an appointment with Queen Elizabeth, who was visiting Ottawa at the end of her 12-day tour of Canada.

MacAulay was originally scheduled to escort the Queen when she visited the RCMP Equestrian Centre. But government officials said it was a bureaucratic mistake and that he never intended to be part of the function.