Evidence of meeting #14 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was budget.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
We did receive a couple of requests which did not provide enough information. So we contacted the people and asked for more details. We had a good relationship with the plaintiffs. This happened three or four times last year.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you for coming back with your colleagues, Commissioner Dawson.
In your report today you talked about achieving a notable reduction and in some cases elimination of backlogs in various operational areas. Can you say a bit more about that? Are there still backlogs in some areas? Which areas would they be? In which areas were they eliminated? Please expand on that a bit for us.
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I think we've done virtually everything we can do now with the backlogs. Basically, there are a number of different deadlines in the act and the code. In the act, there's a 60-day deadline to get your statements in. We're not getting them within the 60 days now only if, for some reason, we aren't told about the new person in the job. As soon as we find out about them, we immediately send a letter. Normally we find out within 10 days or something, and a letter goes out. We're paying a lot of attention to going back. We now have a 30-day check with them if they haven't contacted us, and then a 50-day check with them.
As I said, much of this developed in the context of trying to get a sufficiently regulated system that was rigorous enough that we could start to consider imposing penalties, because we didn't feel we could impose penalties until we'd given people a chance to make sure they knew they had an obligation.
The 60-day deadline is virtually always met now, because we give them the 50-day warning. I think only in one or two cases have we sent them the first stage of an actual penalty imposition. Then they immediately rush in and do it. With the 120-day deadline it's a little more difficult, because sometimes there are very complicated cases that we have to deal with, particularly, for example, with people who have estates to deal with. Technically they have to divest, and there are delays in completing the complicated situations. I forget the number now. Is it 38? That's the number that comes to my mind: 38 out of 1,000 that have not met the 120-day deadline. So we're doing very well, even on the 120-day one. Those are two.
There are other deadlines that are more difficult to deal with, for example, for gifts. You're supposed to report a gift within 30 days. We don't get an awful lot of gifts reported, and that's a difficult one. Our system is like the tax system, only the tax system sort of finds it somehow, one way or another. With gifts being reported, there's really no way we can find out if somebody's getting a gift unless we hear about it somehow. Every so often you see something in the press, and you then contact the person. So I have no way of knowing the extent to which people have failed to disclose their gifts.
There's another one telling us whether they have a firm offer of employment, and they have to do that within seven days, I believe. I think probably we're getting most of those, because we find out when they've left.
Recusals are another one. How the heck do we know if they don't tell us that they should have recused, unless we see in the press or we hear about it from somebody else? Those are the sorts of things on which we might get a request for an investigation, for example.
Is that good?
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Annual reviews is another one. They're supposed to respond within a certain length of time for those too.
That's the panoply, I think.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Where are the eight staffing vacancies? Do they address the issue of backlogs and timing? What work isn't being done that those eight people would do if they were hired on?
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
People would be working less overtime and pulling their hair out a little bit less. That's one thing. It has really been quite a stressful last six months, because there were two sets of reports that surrounded the fact that there was an election, not only on the MP level but on the ministerial staff level. We put in a lot of effort, and that's why the research work maybe hasn't been as much as we would have hoped for. This year was a particularly difficult operational year, and I'm hoping that next year we can move....
The four people we're expecting to come in soon are all in the area of compliance. As for the other four, can you remember, Denise?
Director, Corporate Management, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Two more are in compliance still. There's one in corporate and one in communications and policies.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
In your report today you mentioned again that there was a reserve in case there was an abnormally high demand for inquiries or examinations. Is it a large reserve? Can you tell us a bit about the reserve and the size and whether you've ever had to dip into it?
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
The reserve is $550,000. As I say, only in one case--in this fiscal year, not last fiscal year--have we actually taken a trip in connection with an investigation. But it could happen that we need to do a certain amount of travel. It depends on the investigation. It could be more complex than anything we've done so far.
So that's the sort of thing we want to cover. Denise can give you some of the other reasons for the reserve.
Director, Corporate Management, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
We use part of it for system development. We invested some money in our website. That's why we're not lapsing the full amount of the reserve. On the O and M side, we're lapsing $300,000. We did use part of the reserve for IT development.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Okay.
You haven't had to levy the administrative monetary penalties at this point. If you did, though, where would that penalty money go?
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
It would go to the CRF, I assume. We don't get to pocket it.
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
No, no.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
I have just one quick question--or maybe it's not a quick question.
As an officer of Parliament, you are involved in a different budgetary process than are other levels of government. I wonder if you have any reflections on that process, on how it works or on how well it works. Do you have any reflections that you can offer us on that?
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
It's probably a little bit easier for us than the other agents of Parliament. Basically, we just submit it to the Speaker, the Speaker submits it to the Treasury Board president, and then you as a committee examine it. That's about the top and bottom of it.
NDP
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
So far.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Paul Szabo
I have a feeling the Speaker doesn't do a very rigorous review of your--
Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I can't comment on that.
Liberal