Largest seismic after shock yet from Wilson-Raybould resignation; as Prime Minister's Top Aide Gerald Butts submits his resignation

Gerald Butts, Prime Minister Justin
Trudeau's top political aide has
stepped down from his post
(photo from G Butts twitter feed)

For many provinces across Canada today, it's Family Day and in Ottawa the day has taken on one of high drama for the Liberal Party of Canada family.

That as the principle secretary to the Prime Minister,  Gerald Butts submitting his resignation from the Prime Minister's staff, an announcement which brings the percolating SNC-Lavalin scandal into a second week of growing public speculation.

The political fall out today comes following a week where the Opposition parties have focused on the resignation of  Jody Raybould-Wilson the former Justice Minister and Attorney General and most recently Veterans Affairs Minister.

Her departure from the cabinet of last week put the political pot on full boil and as the week came to an end, the political waters were flowing over and the Liberal hierarchy was clearly trying to foster some form of damage control strategy.

The Liberal response to that resignation has been a scattered affair, with a daily revisit of the talking points and explanations as to why she departed, each day bringing more questions and more demands from the opposition for transparency and accountability on the chain of events.

The letter to the Prime Minister made note that any suggestion that Mr. Butts, or the staff at PMO had put any pressure on the Attorney General were not true, with the former top aide adding that at this moment that it was in the best interests of the office for him to step away as he prepares to defend his reputation.

Taking to his twitter feed following the release of the news of Mr. Butt's departure, the Prime Minister offered up his own comments on the decision of his long time friend and the main architect of his political career.

The news which exploded today out of Ottawa, has as political bombshell's tend to do left many more questions to be answered.

The tone to his letter of resignation leaving many of the political observers in the national capital wondering if the Butts departure is something that portends for much more to come from the political storm.

Much of the Liberals woe in the last week has come from the perception that they were putting the former Cabinet Minister on the outcast list, with a range of rumours an innuendo leaked to the press to suggest that she wasn't a team player and was hard to work with.

The added image of a government trying to rewrite rules to give benefit to a company in the spotlight over ethical issues, only served to put the PM and his aides in the cross hairs of the opposition.

Whoever crafted that strategy only served to make things worse for the government and with the opposition now calling for RCMP investigations and Senate hearings into the mess, the story is clearly not going to leave the news cycle anytime.

The other over riding element of the entire affair is that so far, the former Attorney General has not been allowed to speak to the issues that led to her departure.

Though the feeling out of Ottawa is that her silence may not hold much longer and that the Butts departure was in preparation for the next shoe that may drop from the ongoing drama.

Last week Skeana-Bulkley Valley MP Nathan Cullen, took the lead for the NDP during Justice Committee hearings into the percolating issues of Ms. Raybould-Wilson's resignation and the SCN Lavalin issues, dubbing the percolating scandal #LavScam for twitter.

He provided his latest observation on the social media forum today

The House of Commons returns to work tomorrow morning and one thing is certain, the Tuesday Question Period set to start at 11 AM Pacific time, will be one of the most energetic and heated sessions that Parliament Hill will have seen in a long time.

The forty minutes or so of Q and A in the House may make for the best TV of the day.

You can watch the streaming video from the House through the  CPAC feed, or by way of the nation's news channels, all of which will be focused on the proceedings on the Hill tomorrow.

For more background on notes out of Ottawa see our archive page here.

For a look at a recap of the extraordinary events out of the nations capital, visit our political portal D'Arcy McGee later this evening for our archive of notes on the latest items of note out of Ottawa.

We update our page daily by 11 PM each night.