Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 16th, 2012

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

We will resume. On the speakers' list I have Mr. Calkins.

Thank you, Commissioner, for waiting while the committee dealt with its business.

Mr. Dusseault has 45 seconds left, and then we'll go to Mr. Butt.

Monsieur Dusseault.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I apologize for the interruption. Clearly, we would have preferred to have the vote in public.

Ms. Shepherd, I will ask you a question for which I did not have time earlier.

Some lobbyists establish direct contacts with public office holders, but there are also people who prepare all that work and are not necessarily registered as lobbyists.

Do you think those people should be more subject to the legislation? Should a system be adopted that would make it possible to know who is behind those strategies, who the people preparing the work are?

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Thank you, Monsieur Dusseault. Your time is up.

I'll allow the commissioner a brief response.

[Karen Shepherd]

There are two answers to that. I will try to go over them quickly.

If a lobbyist works for a non-profit organization or company, I think that's included in the preparation. So it should be included in calculating the 20%. When it comes to others—for instance consultants—the legislation is clear. It's a matter of communicating with a public office holder.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Thank you, Commissioner.

Mr. Butt, you have five minutes.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much for being here to help us kind of conclude. I found this study to be very interesting, very helpful, and I think all of us want to make sure that if we bring forward amendments to the legislation, they make it a stronger piece of legislation and make your responsibilities a little easier to carry out.

One of the recommendations you said you did like, which would be a change, is that members of a board would also be included, whether paid or not, as in-house lobbyists. Would that include trade unions as well? So all board members of trade unions, whether or not their direct day-to-day job was to be the lobbyist for the union, would be treated no differently from the board members of a private company. Is that how you would see it?

[Karen Shepherd]

When I was looking at it, it's board members of in-house organizations, so the non-profits and corporations. So, yes, they would be captured.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

That would be covered as well. Okay.

On the rule 8, Mr. Coates from Hill + Knowlton, who was here just before you, came up with an interesting comparison, and I'd like your comment on it. He said that lobbyists under rule 8 really should be treated no differently from the way public servants are treated.

We do know that years ago federal public servants were not prohibited from participating in federal political election campaigns and parties, and so on. That did get changed, but he actually compared the two as not being very much different. Someone who does lobbying, who wants to come out and bang some signs up in my election campaign, really shouldn't be excluded from doing that under rule 8. Is that a fair comparison in your view?

[Karen Shepherd]

As I said, I considered the Public Service Employment Act, political activities, in the determination. But when you look at the objective of that for public servants, it's to assure the public that we have a non-partisan public service. With the Lobbyists' Code of Conduct, and where rule 8 is placing the public office holder in a conflict of interest—as I said, the court case has introduced the real or apparent—it's not equivalent. The Lobbying Act and the Lobbyists' Code of Conduct are there to assure to Canadians that lobbying is being done transparently and to the highest standards.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Another one of the recommendations...and I think there's been a unanimous view that you should have an administrative monetary penalty built in, that you've had some frustration with the referral of some cases to the RCMP, and that perhaps that system isn't working. Would you generally agree that most of the cases you did refer probably would have been better dealt with through an AMP, rather than referring...? They didn't get to the level where there would be such significant offence to the legislation, that having the RCMP involved in that wasn't the appropriate route to go, but it was the only route you currently have. Would that be a fair statement?

[Karen Shepherd]

That's a fair statement. In all of the eight reports I've tabled to Parliament, there are examples of where I could have issued administrative monetary penalties and had reports out faster than has occurred.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

I have asked a number of the witnesses about their view on the current definition of designated public office holder. I think most witnesses, when I've asked this, have said they're relatively comfortable with who's covered under that now.

But I'd like your view. Is it too broad? Do we need different categories? That would also bring in this five-year rule issue, where if somebody were the Minister of Finance for five or six years in Canada and then was no longer a public office holder and wanted to lobby or whatever, it's probably a lot different from Brad Butt, backbench MP, who no longer is a member of Parliament and now wants to continue to earn a living in some way, shape, or form.

Can you comment very quickly on the current definition? Are you still satisfied that it's right? Should there be some flexibility in that five-year rule?

[Karen Shepherd]

As I indicated previously with the five-year prohibition, my experience is that the definition is working. There have been no challenges in cases where I have decided not to continue.

Parliament was quite specific as to why it should be a period of five years and who should be covered. What I mentioned earlier that may be worth consideration is if it's covering the right.... For example, right now you are covering students who might go work as an intern in a minister's office for five years, if they're hired under section 128.

I'm not sure if that's what was intended.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Okay. Fair enough.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Great. Thank you. You had five seconds.

I have a brief item of business for the committee members, so don't all leap up.

I want to once again thank the commissioner and her staff for appearing before the committee, and I'm sure you'll look forward to our report. Thank you for coming.

[Karen Shepherd]

I do. Thank you.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

I'll just let the committee know, in terms of our schedule, that the minister is unavailable to appear before the committee, but the parliamentary secretary, Mr. Saxton, and the officials can appear on March 1 for one hour.

My proposal is that the committee provide, on February 28, drafting instructions for the analyst on the statutory review on lobbying, and that we spend the balance of that meeting starting our review of the CBC report, and on March 1, we hear from the parliamentary secretary and the Treasury Board officials for one hour, and then resume our report on the CBC report.

Mr. Andrews.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Absolutely not, Madam Chair.

We've asked the minister to come before this committee and to answer questions on this matter. We've given him many opportunities to come before us. As for having the parliamentary secretary, we have Mr. Del Mastro, a parliamentary secretary, at every meeting.

This is about getting to the bottom of this. Let's open up the schedule and ask the minister to pick the day, and we'll be here to ask him questions on this. I don't think it's acceptable to have a parliamentary secretary come and speak to a committee when there's already one sitting here at the table.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Mr. Andrews, just to let the committee know, the clerk tried every available date, but the minister is not available.

The person available for the committee—you can't compel the minister to attend—is the parliamentary secretary. I'm at the will of the committee about whether you want to have the parliamentary secretary and officials.

I have Monsieur Morin.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

I want to say that we, the NDP members, totally agree with what our Liberal colleague just said. As part of this committee's work, we are prepared to make the necessary arrangements to hear from the President of the Treasury Board, regardless of the date. We know that he is a busy man, but it's very important that he appear before the committee. Therefore, I want to reiterate the recommendation that we find a way to make it happen.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

We can go back to the minister and have a more open-ended invitation, but the problem is that if the minister is not available for several weeks, it will delay the final report.

Again, I'm at the will of the committee.

Mr. Andrews.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I think that's a fair recommendation. I know that our clerk has worked very hard to get the minister here; it's not the clerk's fault. It's the minister's fault for trying to avoid coming to this committee.

Let's go back to him with an open invitation. If that has to delay this study by two, three, or four months—whenever the minister would like to come—so be it.

[The Chair, NDP, Jean Crowder]

Mr. Butt.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Listen, we can put the request in again. I think the parliamentary secretary and the senior officials are willing to come.

This is a bit of a different story, because this is a statutory review of an existing piece of legislation. This is not a new piece of legislation being advanced by the government, where it would normally be the case for the minister to come and defend that piece of legislation at a standing committee. This is totally different. It's a five-year statutory review of an existing piece of legislation that we already have on the books, where we're looking at some minor changes, potentially, to the act to strengthen it a little bit.

If the minister, who is obviously a very busy individual, isn't able to come, but the parliamentary secretary is able to be here with senior officials, I don't see why the committee wouldn't think that was an appropriate response from the ministry for this process.

[Patricia Davidson, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

I can understand the disappointment of all the members. I think we all would have liked to see the minister, but if he can't be here, he can't be here. We certainly cannot compel any minister to be here.

We have a lot of other things that we need to move on with in this committee, and I think we should go ahead with the meeting as you have suggested. If there is an opportunity for the minister to come at another time, we should pursue that. But if he can't be here in the timeframe that the clerk has offered, we need to move on and deal with the parliamentary secretary, as suggested.