Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

Set out below is a letter-to-the-editor by Democracy Watch Coordinator Tyler Sommers which was published in the Huffington Post, July 30, 2012

The federal Conservatives responded to the influence-peddling charges that former Prime Minister Harper adviser Bruce Carson is facing by issuing a statement saying “any individual who doesn’t respect our laws must face their full force, as well as the consequences that come with them.”

This is a deeply hypocritical statement from the Conservatives whose leader, Prime Minister Harper, has done nothing to penalize dozens of Conservative Cabinet ministers and MPs who violated federal good government rules by handing out government cheques labelled with the Conservative Party logo, and has done nothing to penalize Cabinet ministers Christian Paradis (who violated the federal ethics law), Tony Clement (who violated federal spending rules in the G8-G20 fiasco), Jim Flaherty and Peter MacKay (who violated federal budget rules by hiding the actual cost of the fighter jets), Peter MacKay again (who violated rules by using a military helicopter for a personal purpose), and Bev Oda (who violated rules governing expenses, and also misled Parliament).

In some cases, these ministers and others have faced no consequences for violating key rules also because a watchdog agency like the Auditor General or Ethics Commissioner has no power to penalize them, or has failed to enforce the law effectively and properly and no one is allowed to challenge their improper enforcement in court.

Because nothing can be done to force a Prime Minister to penalize Cabinet ministers and politicians who violate rules, the watchdog agencies must be required to conduct random audits and to investigate all complaints and situations in which there is evidence of a violation, and must be given the power to, and required to, penalize violators, and everyone must be allowed to challenge any watchdog in court who fails to enforce rules properly.

As well, the huge loopholes must be closed in key good government laws because these loopholes currently make it legal in many cases for people involved in politics to be dishonest, unethical, secretive and wasteful.

For example, loopholes in the federal lobbying law, and weak enforcement, have meant that no one has been prosecuted for failing to register as a lobbyist since the law was enacted in 1988, and dozens of lobbyists have been let off the hook (archive website). Recently, a House of Commons Committee has recommended some changes to close some of the loopholes in that law, and to strengthen enforcement, but not enough changes to stop secret, unethical lobbying of the federal government.

For more details, go to Democracy Watch’s Government Ethics Campaign

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

Set out below is a letter-to-the-editor by Democracy Watch Coordinator Tyler Sommers which was published in the The Edmonton Journal, The National Post, and The Epoch Times, July 12, 2012 and the Hill Times July 23, 2012

 

In the Supreme Court of Canada case about voting in a Toronto area riding during last May’s federal election, Elections Canada and some provincial elections agencies seem to be arguing that problems are inevitable instead of acknowledging that their current systems have significant weaknesses in ensuring that voters are voting properly at the correct polling station.

The robocall election fraud situation has revealed other weaknesses in fair election enforcement.

And these two situations are likely the tip of the iceberg, as there are more than 3,000 complaints that Elections Canada alone has received since 1997. Unfortunately, Elections Canada continues to refuse to disclose its rulings in those complaints, so the public has no idea whether enforcement of the rules has been proper and effective in the past six federal elections.

[ NOTE: To see info about the 3,000 complaints, go to: this news release — Democracy Watch will soon release details about a recent Elections Canada ruling that raises serious questions about its enforcement standards ]

Rather than defending systems with loopholes, and hiding enforcement records, Elections Canada and the provincial agencies should be disclosing details to prove their enforcement is effective, and pushing for stronger laws and more resources and training to ensure our future elections are fraud-free.

 

 

For more details about the changes needed to Elections Canada go to April 16 News release

Set out below is a letter-to-the-editor by Democracy Watch Founder Duff Conacher which was published in the Hill Times, July 23, 2012

TORONTO—The Hill Times’ 12th Annual Terrific 25 Staffers Survey of people involved in federal politics was most revealing because the ranking criteria did not include “most ethical staffer.” If members of the public were surveyed, this would very likely be their most important criteria given that dishonesty, secrecy, unethical activities, lack of representation and waste consistently rank as the Canadians’ top concerns about government.

Instead, according to the survey, political staff are valued for being most discreet (i.e. most secretive), closest to the Prime Minister and most influential (i.e. among other things, most likely to change elected politicians’ decisions (including for lobbyists), and best at spin (i.e. most misleading), along with most knowledgeable and most experienced.

Would Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s chief of staff Nigel Wright be named “most ethical?” The Conflict of Interest Act does not require (archive website) him to recuse himself from any general matter decision-making process even if it will directly affect his personal financial interests, or the interests of his family or friends or the dozens of companies in which his company, Onex, is invested, or the interests of the companies in which the two other private holding companies he owns are invested, or the two dozen or so other companies in which he own shares, or the other investments he placed in his so-called blind trust.

In fact, he has not disclosed any recusals from any decision-making processes in the Public Registry for the Act. That may be because federal Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson has set up a system of so-called “ethical screens” to hide recusals by Cabinet ministers, staff and appointees, a system that violates Sec. 25 of the Act (which requires public disclosure of the details of all recusals).

What the ethics commissioner did, according to her public testimony by her before House committees, is just arrange for public office holders to recuse themselves from whole areas of decision-making, but not declare it. She has admitted more recently that this is not a correct approach, but is still only requiring disclosure of some of those recusals, again, according to testimony by her before House committees.

But, in any case, isn’t it reasonable to say that an ethical person would recuse him/herself from all decision-making processes that affect their personal financial interests, and would publicly disclose their recusals, even if a flawed law combined with a lapdog ethics commissioner do not require these actions?

As for Andrew MacDougall, director of communications for the Prime Minister, he “helps when he can,” according to Yaroslav Baran, a former Conservative staffer. Does he help everyone equally? Or does he give more help to people who have worked in the past for Prime Minister Harper, Conservative Cabinet ministers, and Conservative Party election campaigns?

If it’s the latter, that sounds very similar to giving preferential treatment which is not allowed under Sec. 7 of the Conflict of Interest Act (as Conservative Cabinet minister Christian Paradis found out recently, although because the act does not include any penalties for violations of its key democratic good government rules, and because Prime Minister Harper regularly ignores the Act and his own rules set out in the Accountable Government guide for ministers, Paradis remains an unpenalized Cabinet minister).

And in case anyone is wondering, these same loopholes and flaws (and others), and weak enforcement (archive website) by Dawson, also undermine the ethical standards set out in the Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons, and (even more so), the ethical standards set out in the Senate Ethics Code (in no small part because the Senate Ethics Officer is under the control of a committee of Senators).

And as for all other political staffers, except senior staff in the Opposition Leader’s Office, no ethics rules apply to them, and they are not required to disclose any personal interests (not even financial interests), so who knows how their actions would measure up to ethics criteria if such criteria were included in your definition of a “terrific” staffer.

Maybe they are all acting honestly, ethically, openly, representatively, and preventing waste all of the time. The public has a right to know whether they are acting in these ways (since we pay their salaries), but we won’t know until rules are applied to them requiring them to act properly, with full disclosure requirements, and independent enforcement by a fully-empowered, well-resourced watchdog with a strong enforcement approach (unlike the ethics commissioner), and the power to penalize violators.

Knowing how committed all of the federal politicians are to democratic good government, I am sure that the MPs on the House Procedural Affairs Committee will strongly recommend closing the huge loopholes and correcting the flaws and strengthening enforcement of the MPs’ ethics code when they continue their review of the code after Parliament opens again in September. And I am also sure that the House will make those changes right away.

I am also sure that the House or Senate or joint committee that reviews the Conflict of Interest Act soon (the review is already seven months (archive website) past its legal five-year deadline) will also make strong recommendations to close the loopholes in, and strengthen enforcement of, the act, and that the Conservative Cabinet will introduce a bill that will make those changes that will pass quickly and unanimously.

I am also sure that the Senate will clean up its ethics act sooner than later.

And I am also sure that an ethics law or code will soon be enacted to apply to political staffers, so that you can add it to your survey criteria.

I am so sure of all of these things because I have faith that federal politicians will do the right ethical thing very soon, even though they haven’t for the past 145 years, unfortunately. Better to hope than to despair, as someone said recently.

For more details, go to Democracy Watch’s Government Ethics Campaign

Sorry, this entry is only available in Français.

Set out below is a letter-to-the-editor by Democracy Watch Founder Duff Conacher which was published in the iPolitics, The Tyee, and Rabble.ca, July 19, 2012

As has happened almost every time (archive website) she has issued a ruling, federal Ethics Commissioner Mary Dawson has again ignored evidence and rules in her ruling that Cabinet minister Tony Clement did nothing wrong when he endorsed a company in his riding in a promotional video and in two letters.

The Ethics Commissioner ruled in March that Cabinet minister Christian Paradis was guilty (archive website) of giving “preferential treatment” in violation of section 7 the Conflict of Interest Act setting the standard that it is illegal for ministers “to use their positions as ministers to provide greater assistance to their constituents than to other Canadians in relation to their own department or larger portfolio.”

In clear contrast, the Ethics Commissioner only warns Minister Clement not to do this again, instead of finding him guilty.

And in making that ruling about Minister Clement’s appearance in the video, the Ethics Commissioner ignored the letter that Clement also wrote that “encouraged an individual in Dubai to explore working with” the same company. The Ethics Commissioner also failed to disclose the text of that letter, and another promotional letter, that Clement wrote for the company.

In contrast, the Ethics Commissioner found former Minister of State Helena Guergis guilty of violating federal ethics rules for writing a very similar letter.

Given that giving such “preferential treatment” is a violation of the Act, it is by definition “improper” which means that the Ethics Commissioner should have also found Minister Clement of violating section 9 of the Act which prohibits acting in ways that “improperly further another person’s private interests.”

This ruling provides even more evidence that federal government ethics rules will not be properly and effectively enforced as long as Mary Dawson is the Ethics Commissioner.

 

 

For more details, go to Democracy Watch’s Government Ethics Campaign