Eve Adams riding fight: Party investigates at PM's request

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has asked the Conservative Party's national council to investigate new allegations against MP Eve Adams of improperly using constituents' private information in her bid to win a nomination in a newly formed riding.

In a letter obtained by CBC News, Mark Fedak, president of the Oakville North-Burlington Conservative riding association, said Adams's actions were "negatively impacting the internal workings of our own local association and taking toll on the brand of the party."

Oakville-North Burlington is at the centre of a bitter battle that has cost Adams's fiancé, Dimitri Soudas, his job as the party's executive director.

Adams is seeking the party's nomination in the new riding where she and Soudas currently share a house.

Soudas was removed this week after a dramatic confrontation with senior party officials over using his position to advance Adams's bid for the nomination in the new riding.

The letter, sent to the Prime MInister's Office, senior party officials and the Ontario Conservative caucus, alleges Adams showed up at the new riding's board meeting on March 19 and demanded to know how much money Fedak had donated to the party. She allegedly threatened to use her access to the Conservative electronic database known as CIMS to look up the information herself.

Fedak writes that he asked Adams to leave a total of nine times.

Adams's response, wrote Fedak, was to "continue to filibuster the meeting without ever being recognized with a right to speak."

Adams is also accused of telling a company contacted by the riding executive to produce coloured maps on voting history in the new riding to refuse to do the work.

Mitch Wexler, principal at Politrain Consulting, wouldn't discuss a specific campaign, but said that he generally doesn't work for two sides of one race.

"Often, the work that I do is strategic and so I don't do work on both sides of a campaign even if I am perfectly friendly with people on both sides of the campaign. Ethically, it's important for me not to be in a position where I'm in a conflict," Wexler told CBC News.

Adams's supporters have said the board of directors of the Oakville North-Burlington riding association is made up mostly of supporters of her competitor for the nomination, Natalia Lishchyna.

Fedak writes he worries whether she has given the same order to other companies.

"We are perplexed as to how someone who was never elected, either by nomination or through a general election, can veto suppliers to our EDA [Electoral district association]."

Soudas had assured the party in writing that he would not interfere in any riding nomination contest that involved Adams even though his job was to oversee nominations in 337 other ridings in preparation for the 2015 election.

Adams, who currently represents the riding of Mississauga-Brampton South, has not been in the Commons this week, but has been active on Twitter and her absence has reportedly raised the ire of the Conservative Party whip.

Fedak, contacted Wednesday by CBC News, said his letter is a "private matter" and refused to comment.