Stephen Harper says staffers such as Ray Novak enjoy his confidence

You would think that since Duffy incurred the expenses it was important that he paid them back not someone such as Wright who was paying Duffy to do what Harper wanted. And Wright said he told Harper was that he was going to get Duffy to repay in order to set a precedent that errant senators would be held accountable, but didn’t go into specifics. That’s when Wright told Perrin he would personally cover Duffy’s Senate expenses.

Perrin’s appearance at the trial comes on the heels of testimony from Harper’s former chief of staff, Nigel Wright.

Court: “Because it was so surprising to me, I immediately looked to my right to see Mr. Novak’s reaction and he didn’t have any reaction to that information”, Perrin, on how Novak was in the loop.

Harper himself has rejected questions from reporters specifically on Novak’s knowledge of the payment.

Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe said it is time either for Novak to quit or for Harper to fire him.

Mr. Perrin, however, testified that there were many things going on in the Duffy affair that he was not aware of – and that he feels he was “blindsided” in the affair. What I know is that Mr. Duffy should have repaid his expenses. “Senator Duffy didn’t want to repay”.

Perrin did a legal review of the agreement Wright struck with Duffy.

Perrin also characterized Duffy’s negotiation points as a list of demands. Duffy’s housing allowance claims and other expenses, which the Senator had until then been putting off as his lawyer continued pressing for commitments from the PMO for the extraction of Sen. “I would not be able to consider myself a resident of Nunavut, having never visited there, simply by buying $4,000 in real property”, he said, referring to the lightly populated territory in northern Canada. “I arrived at Mr. Wright’s office three or four minutes before that call was supposed to start”, he told the court.

He added he convinced Duffy’s lawyer to drop the RCMP from her proposed wording, because he felt the “any other party” line “was sufficient broad language”.

The question of how much Harper knew about Duffy’s expense saga before it burst into the public spotlight has dogged the prime minister for years and continues to follow him on the campaign.

After a Conservative supporter made national headlines with his pro-Harper rant, it was only a matter of time before the memes began making the rounds online.

Perrin’s testimony also contrasts with that of Wright, who at first testified under cross-examination that only Perrin and himself were on the call with Payne. Among those emails was one sent from Wright to Novak and Perrin on March 23, 2013, which read: “I will send my cheque on Monday”.

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair’s name was most often mentioned with the economy, with oil and pipelines following behind in second place.

When asked Friday why he still has confidence in Novak – his current chief of staff – Harper turned to a well-worn message: “There are two people who are responsible for the actions here”, he said, meaning Duffy and Wright. In the event that they didn’t have my confidence, they wouldn’t be working for me. However, the money was given to Duffy by Nigel Wright via a personal check.

“Let’s just say that there was a difference of opinion, and that Perrin was evidently one of the very few people who was willing to express that”, Léger said.