WINNIPEG- A former Manitoba Progressive Conservative cabinet minister is denying accusations by two former colleagues that he tried to rush approval of a proposed mining project. Jeff Wharton says he was simply gathering information about the planned Sio Silica mine after the Tories lost the Oct. 3 election, in order to pass it on to the incoming NDP government. Two Tory ministers who were defeated in the election, Kevin Klein and Rochelle Squires, say Wharton called them and, in separate conversations, asked them to get the project approved before the NDP government was to be sworn-in. Klein and Squires both say they refused for a few reasons, including a long-standing constitutional practice called the caretaker convention, which forbids outgoing governments from making most major decisions. In the end, no licence

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