Information & Ethics Committee on Feb. 25th, 2009

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

Yes, I just want to talk ever so briefly more, because I am actually looking forward to hearing from Mr. Walsh.

You have indicated that there needs to be some clarification here. You said to Ms. Freeman that perhaps her expectations are out of line with what she's hoping to accomplish, based on the comments that she's made. If the Speaker says that this is the parameter under which we can investigate this, I think that would provide our committee a great deal of assistance.

I know that in the last Parliament there was much discussion about the very issue that we're discussing--whether or not it's within the mandate. I think all of us would be relieved to find out whether or not it is. It does not need to take a great deal of time. There's no reason why we wouldn't want to know what the Speaker has to say about this ruling. We all certainly want to operate within the mandate of the Standing Orders; there's no fear there.

It would be my hope that we could quickly address this matter, and if ruled in order, the study would commence according to how the planning committee chooses to put it in our priorities.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

You can see why the chair should really not say very much, because others may interpret or put words in one's mouth. I'm not going to say anything more.

Mr. Wrzesnewskyj, please.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

I'd hate to think that in some of the discussions that are taking place we might be engaging in delay tactics to avoid the inevitable.

I'd like to go back to a comment made by Mr. Dechert. He referenced wasting tax dollars and perhaps going down a path that isn't within our mandate. It's been made quite clear that it's a very limited mandate we have. It's public officer-holders; that's been defined to us. I can't imagine how much clearer it could be. Those are the only individuals this would pertain to. I'm very concerned that by continuing this discussion while talking about wasting taxpayers' dollars by going down this path, we are in fact doing that. We're wasting time and wasting taxpayers' dollars.

Let's not forget that at the very core of this was the fact that Elections Canada was seriously disturbed, and criminal investigations have begun, because it appears that taxpayers were abused by individuals who were public office-holders. That's a very serious allegation. If we allow that to slip by us, it seriously undermines the confidence the public holds for public office-holders, and it gets to the very essence of whether or not we respect those taxpaying citizens.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Madam Simson, please.

[Michelle Simson, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to speak to Mr. Hiebert's motion.

I don't know how we could include that in this motion, based on the fact that the chair has stated earlier that we can't get a ruling from the Speaker without presenting a report. I understood that very clearly. So I don't know how we ask permission to proceed with this, because it was quite clear that he would only rule on a report from the committee, and if it were deemed not to be within our purview, it would not be presented in the House.

I also want to take issue with the public office-holder, and I'd like to thank the chair for clarifying that. There is no question--it's a matter of public record--that the returns that are filed are dated; and if that date is subsequent to the swearing in of a minister, I'd have to argue that it indeed falls within our purview.

That's all I'd like to say. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Dechert, please.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Mr. Chair, I'd like to respond to Mr. Wrzesnewskyj's point about the timing.

First of all, we asked that we simply wait to deal with this motion until we've heard from the legal officer of Parliament. That's what he's there for, to give us advice. As legal counsel for 25 years, I always advise my clients to get a little bit of legal advice before they go into any business venture or venture down any other path of procedure not knowing the actual legal viability or legal mandate of what they're trying to do. So I think that's something we could simply do by waiting until later today and not be wasting a significant amount of taxpayer dollars, as we might, by doing a multi-week or month-long study.

Second, as Mr. Hiebert pointed out, getting a ruling from the Speaker based on the opinion, I assume, from the same legal officer we're going to hear from later day presumably would not take very long. If we don't do that, we have to explain to the taxpayers we represent why we didn't get a legal opinion from a gentleman who's employed by the taxpayers to give legal opinions on matters just like this before we embark on a very expensive study. It just makes sense to me to do that.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Hiebert.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

Following along Mr. Dechert's point, to answer your question, Ms. Simson, he's absolutely right. The Speaker would provide us a legal opinion in consultation with Mr. Walsh, the very person we're here to hear from.

There are two ways to do this. We could have Mr. Walsh give us his opinion and have an answer this afternoon as to whether this motion is in order, or we could pursue the amendment and seek the Speaker to consult with the law clerk to give us a ruling.

It's prudent. There's nothing sinister about wanting to know whether we're operating within the mandate of this committee. I don't know what the concern is.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Siksay.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I don't support the amendment. I don't think it adds anything to it. What we're doing is resuming a study that has already been ruled in order, and the limitations on that study have been clarified. I don't believe the addition that's being proposed will further clarify anything for us. I think we need to get on with the work, make our report, and see where it goes from there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Madam Simson.

[Michelle Simson, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

To the point that Mr. Hiebert made, I think it's fairly clear what the mandate of this committee is. I understood it when the chair read it out to us. It was about public office-holders. I don't know about this, other than calling Mr. Walsh in and simply asking him if it is his legal opinion, in his capacity as law clerk, that they were or were not public office-holders.

I wasn't here at the time, but I believe this investigation or study was undertaken as a result of Elections Canada concerns that were raised with respect to what transpired with election expenses. This was subsequently investigated with respect to public office-holders. As the chair indicated, it wasn't the Conservative Party and it wasn't members of Parliament, and it would have been related to precisely what we're mandated to do.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

We have to be careful about summarizing what's already been said, but we're going to move on to Mr. Hiebert.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

I'd just like to respond to Ms. Simson.

I was here in the last Parliament, and you know what, the suggestions you make are fairly common sense suggestions. You'd think that this committee in the last Parliament would have consulted the law clerk as to whether or not this study was within its order or within its mandate, but the reality is that it never happened.

The chair's ruling came after lengthy debate. More than several meetings occurred prior to the chair's ruling on whether or not this particular study was in order. His ruling was then challenged. It was upheld only because of the brute force of the opposition parties pushing it over the top.

So to suggest that this is a common sense approach doesn't really summarize the degree to which this question needs to be debated. The very first question I would ask Mr. Walsh, the law clerk, would be exactly the question you raised. Based on subparagraphs 108(3)(h)(v) and (vi), does the ethics committee, as its mandate, have the responsibility or the authority to investigate individuals who are not public office-holders without specific authorization from the House?

Clarity is needed here. We're not asking irrelevant questions. These go to the heart of our mandate. I think we can very quickly get the answers. It's unfortunate that we didn't have this opportunity before we commenced on weeks and weeks and, as Mr. Chair states, thousands of pages of testimony, but the reality is that it never happened.

My hope is that we start off on the right foot this time, that we just get some clarification from the law clerk very quickly and reasonably, giving us the answers to our questions about whether or not this has been our mandate. If it is, so be it, and let's commence this study, but prudence, reasonableness, and accountability to the Canadian people would suggest that we answer those questions first and not make the presumption that it's within our mandate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Dechert, please.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to make this clear in response to Ms. Simson's comment that we would not be simply asking the legal officer of Parliament for his opinion on the definition of public office-holder. You may also recall I made an argument earlier that in subparagraph 108(3)(h)(vi) the word “and” is different from the word “or” in subparagraph 108(3)(h)(v), as used prior to the words “the ethical standards of public office holders”. There's a reason that two different words were used there.

We would be asking him to give us his opinion on the study itself as to whether it's within the mandate, based not just on the definition of public office-holder but on the interpretation of that whole subparagraph. That's a significant legal argument, and one, I would suggest, that probably comes up in the mandates of many other committees of Parliament.

On this very important matter, I think it's of great value to Parliament and to the taxpayers to have the legal opinion of someone who's employed by Parliament, to have those legal opinions before we launch into a multi-meeting, multi-week, or multi-month study dealing with three or four thousand pages of information, as the chair has pointed out.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Mr. Hiebert.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

In light of this discussion, I'm wondering if perhaps Ms. Freeman can give us her discretion. Would she be willing to allow the law clerk to enter and to answer a few simple questions? We can get this out of the way very quickly and we could resume this discussion and have a vote perhaps even later today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

If I may, Madam Freeman, Mr. Walsh was a witness for us two meetings ago. We only had him for the last five minutes because we seemed to go a little longer on the first item. I guess we didn't want to hear what he had to say then. But he was asked to come, and I think if you go back to the steering committee discussion and to the meeting we had subsequently, the whole reason for having Mr. Walsh had to do with contempt of Parliament issues, which I raised because of the Mulroney-Schreiber hearings, because of the subsequent evidence that came out, disclosed by The Fifth Estate and provided to me by Mr. Schreiber himself. This evidence showed, if the evidence was valid and real, that Mr. Fred Doucet, the subsequent president of GCI, Marc Lalonde, and I think one other person had lied to the committee during their testimony before the committee.

I asked if we could have Mr. Walsh to determine whether or not we could bring that forward and whether the timing and all other good things, and how do we do this...simply because I wasn't sure. I did not ever mention that we should have Mr. Walsh to advise us on our mandate. And I can tell you that, in my opinion, he would not give us an opinion on whether this matter was within our mandate because he knows what the Speaker ruled already, that--

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

If that's the case, Mr. Chair, then why not give him the opportunity to answer?

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

Here's how we go in circles. I agree. If that would help members, I think it would be useful to let him say, “I cannot answer that question; the committee is the master of its own work”. But I also said--and it is overriding in this regard--that the member put a motion forward. The motion has the proper notice, and for all its bumps and warts, it's in order, we're debating it, and we're going to have to deal with it. And if the member and the committee can't seem to find a way to get to where we would prefer to be, or where some would prefer to be, that's unfortunate, but we're going to have to deal with the problem we have in front of us.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Chair, I'm not asking for a ruling now. Just to respond to your point, were you suggesting, then, that we would be limited in the questions we'd be allowed to ask Mr. Wash, were he here?

[The Chair, Liberal, Paul Szabo]

From what I understand from the committee members, they would like to ask Mr. Walsh whether, in his opinion, doing this would be within our mandate. That's vanilla questioning.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Correct, that's one way. An interpretation--