Yellowknife (July 04/01) - Lawyers from both sides will, next week, argue the merits of an unprecedented bias complaint levelled by the deputy premier against the conflict of interest commissioner.

Brendan Bell

A special committee will hear from lawyers for both Jane Groenewegen and Carol Roberts on July 12 at the legislative assembly.

That's two months to the day that deputy premier Groenewegen filed an application to have Roberts removed from her investigation of a conflict of interest complaint against Groenewegen.

Roberts has finished her report on her investigation. The special committee was appointed by the legislative assembly when Roberts threatened to release her report.

The meeting will be open to the public and written submissions from the lawyers will be available to the public at 9 a.m. the day of the hearing. The hearing begins at 3 p.m.

"We anticipate this thing will go through a supper break and on into the evening," said the committee's chair, Yellowknife MLA Brendan Bell.

Bell said lawyers from both sides agreed to a process for submitting written arguments and were working last week on finalizing a process for the hearing.

One piece of evidence that will not be reviewed is Robert's report. Bell said no MLAs have seen the report.

"It's not like we're sitting on this thing, like we've gone through it and didn't like what we saw," he said.

Legislative law clerk Katherine Peterson said once all the written arguments are submitted, the committee will be able to determine if any witnesses will have to be called at a later date.

Peterson said the only reason for calling witnesses would be to clarify any disputes that may exist about the facts presented in the arguments.