(The closed-circuit testimony of two of the three caregivers was no less emotional. Richelyn Tongson broke down as she talked about her four children and out-of-work husband back home, and the pressures of trying to support them. “I don’t want to see them starving,” she wailed. Magdalene Gordo repeated charges that her duties were mostly domestic, including cleaning the basement apartment of Dhalla’s cousin once a week, and had little to do with looking after Tavinder—who no longer has a caregiver, and is the MP’s designated travel companion. “I felt like a vacuum cleaner being on loan,” she said. “I was mentally tortured and physically stressed . . . You are being insulted. They show you, you are really a slave.” And Gordo reiterated that it was Ruby Dhalla, not her brother or mother, who hired and supervised her.)
Meanwhile Dhalla’s supporters and family are busy pushing the conspiracy theory. “I think it’s all political,” says Paul Dhillon, her uncle, who still resides in Winnipeg. “We’re all immigrants. We’ve all been through this. Treating people like this is not possible for us.” He mentioned the nice basement suite—with 60-inch flat screen and mahogany furniture—where the nannies lived. “Nice, perfect conditions.” And he says that his nephew Neil would never demand that a caregiver polish his shoes daily. “He’s got a machine in his closet. He does it himself,” says Dhillon.
Once it became known that Maclean’s was preparing an article on Dhalla, the reporter’s phone started ringing with people seeking to share their unsolicited testimonials. Someone claiming to be from her office went even further, posing as a potential source and engaging in a ham-fisted fishing expedition for the names of others who had talked to the magazine.
It’s hard to blame them. The stakes couldn’t be higher for a woman whose entire life has so far been focused on making her mark in Ottawa. But already the waters have been muddied enough to suggest that Dhalla’s career will survive this brush with scandal. Her constituency office was fastidiously scrubbed clean of all Liberal posters, pamphlets and photos for her press conference, and she did have to resign from her post as youth and multiculturalism critic. But Ruby was an early supporter of Michael Ignatieff, and the new leader appears content to let her ride this controversy out from the backbench.
David Walker, her one-time Liberal mentor, has seen it all before. “When you become a star at her age, you can fall pretty quickly when you make a mistake, because you don’t have a reservoir of goodwill and friendships built up over 20 or 30 years,” he says. But Ruby being Ruby, Walker has no doubt that she will rise again. “These issues will linger for her for a while. But she’s so smart. She’ll just have to apply all of her skills.”
