Mark King, who was ousted as the Conservative candidate for Nipissing-Timiskaming, claims he did nothing wrong when he used his company’s business credit card to buy a membership to the party.
However, Elections Canada has a different viewpoint.
Officials within the Conservative Party replaced King with the runner-up at the June 17th nomination meeting, Jordy Carr, a town councillor in Callander.
The party said King broke the rules by using a corporate credit card to buy the party membership for himself and family members.
King said although his business is incorporated and he has a corporate credit card, he used a business credit card with his name on it to buy the membership and added this was alright to do.
But Elections Canada doesn’t agree.
Ghislain Desjardins is the Senior Advisor of Media Relations and Issues Management Communications Services at Elections Canada.
Desjardins says if King’s business was a sole proprietorship, then it would have been alright to use a business credit card.
However, Desjardins says a business credit card cannot be used if the business is a corporation which King admits is the nature of his business.
Desjardins says when a business credit card is used to buy a membership to a political party, the nature of the business has to be considered.
As for King, he has called a news conference for Wednesday morning to talk about his political future.