Information & Ethics Committee on Dec. 14th, 2010

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

Does that fear factor run out at some point, though? Does it require that somebody gets raked over the coals publicly at some point, or charged, to maintain that kind of commitment that folks don't want to get into trouble with the act or the code?

[Karen Shepherd]

When I'm looking at the late filings—that's what I was saying with transparency—right now it's not worth sending something to the RCMP if somebody's late, even if they're late a couple of times, unless I clearly see they're maybe missing key policy decisions that are constantly occurring, so is there an attempt or negligence on their part.

Having something in between might help with ensuring that people actually do file on time.

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

Mr. Bergen, when I was last questioning I was asking about the alternative dispute resolution and the essay. You mentioned it was a case where there was also a provincial prosecution and that this had proceeded to a charge, I believe. Can you tell us which province that was? Has that province got better legislation, that they actually get something that moves to a prosecution?

[Bruce Bergen]

It was one of the provinces Ms. Shepherd did refer to earlier; it was British Columbia.

I know you're a member of Parliament from British Columbia, and you might recognize the name Mr. Ken Dobell. He's the person in question who was lobbying on behalf of the City of Vancouver with the Province of British Columbia and a couple of different federal departments.

At the time, British Columbia's Lobbyists Registration Act was very similar to our federal Lobbyists Registration Act, prior to the changes put into place by the Lobbying Act. British Columbia has now in fact amended their act and toughened it up to include one thing that was lacking at the time, which is administrative monetary penalties.

In a way, it's a bit of apples and oranges, but that's the situation.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Mr. Easter, four minutes.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I won't take the four, I don't think, Mr. Chair.

Thus far I have ended up being one of the top five most lobbied MPs on the Hill, and I sometimes wonder who is lobbying and if they're registered lobbyists or not.

I meet with a lot of people from the farm movement. They're farmers. They do not have to be registered, correct? If the representatives are from the official farm body that is lobbying on legislation or issues relative to the agricultural community, then they do have to be registered. Am I correct in that?

[Karen Shepherd]

Aside from being obviously paid and communicating, as you indicated, on a registerable activity, there would also be the test as to whether they're hitting the significant amount of time and whether registration for even the association would be registered.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Okay.

[Bruce Bergen]

If I may, in other words, if say the Kings County potato growers association were an entirely voluntary association and people weren't paid in that organization, it would not be required to register. There's no payment involved.

On the other hand, if the Prince Edward Island potato growers association—I'm making this up—had a large organization and a group of people, executive and employees, who were paid to operate within that organization, and they lobbied federal public office holders, they would secondarily have to meet the 20% “significant amount of duties” test.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Good. I think that covers what I need.

I guess the concern from our side is making sure we have the list of the when, the who, and basically what the issue is. These new changes create a fair bit more work in MPs' offices as well.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Mr. Poilievre, four minutes.

Mr. Albrecht?

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

I wasn't planning on asking this, but Mr. Easter asked a question and the response was different from what I understood earlier.

Mr. Bergen, you just said they would have to meet the criteria of being paid and spending 20% of their time.... Okay, I'm glad that was clarified. I was under the impression earlier that it was either/or. It's both--and.

[Bruce Bergen]

The way the act is written now, under the section 7 requirements to register, if an organization or a corporation that actually pays people is doing lobbying activity, but to a very minimal amount, they're not required to register. I think that's exactly what Parliament intended by putting the significant amount of duties test in there. That has been interpreted as 20% over these many years.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

To follow up on that, theoretically a municipal employee could lobby a member of Parliament on behalf of a particular project, but because they're only spending 2% of their time lobbying--

[Bruce Bergen]

They're exempted. Employees of other levels of government in Canada are exempted from the Lobbying Act.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

That's another good point of clarification.

[Bruce Bergen]

Provincial, municipal, aboriginal band council are not required to register because that's communication between levels of government and not registrable lobbying activity.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Mr. Albrecht.

I have just a couple of remaining points, Ms. Shepherd, in your annual report for 2008-09. And I'll just get you to give me a written answer to this, through the clerk.

This is on page 22: “One investigation report has been submitted for the Commissioner's consideration, with a remaining five still under review. ” Can you give us what exactly happened to those other five? We don't need the names or the details, just what happened to the five that were under review. This would have been as of March 31, 2009.

As my last issue, Ms. Shepherd, I've listened to your evidence all afternoon, and when I look at these investigations they seem to take an inordinate amount of time, especially when they go to the RCMP and back. Even when they're in your office, some of them go on literally for years.

I have two points on that. First, do you really think you're being fair to the people being complained against? They expect due process. Second, are you not running the risk, if it ever did go to court, of meeting the charge by the defence of due process and your prosecution would be unsuccessful, mainly because of the time it took the investigation to be concluded and all the red tape that goes on in your office before these things are adjudicated?

[Karen Shepherd]

According to the terms of due process, one of the reasons it's taking some of the time it does is to make sure I have all the relevant information before me, because people's reputations are at stake.

In terms of the time, you're right: some of them have taken some years. One of the things is we were staffing up, as we have been doing over the last few years. I'm now at a comfortable level. We've been refining processes. I'm not expecting things to be taking years any more. Once I start tabling in the new year you will see more of a regular process.

When I look at the administrative reviews--and I think it's on one of my charts in terms of open and closed--we're starting to keep pace of the administrative reviews on a regular basis in terms of what we open and close. We are trying to take care of that issue in terms of the length of time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

That concludes the questions. We're going to suspend for a minute and go in camera.

Before I do that, Ms. Shepherd, on behalf of every member of the committee, I want to thank you and Mr. Bergen and Mr. Leblanc.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Before we suspend, I wonder if we could potentially deal with my motion in public session.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

We can, but I'm going to allow them to.... Okay, we'll stay in public to deal with that, if you want to.

Thank you for your appearance here today. Do you have any closing remarks you want to make to the committee?

[Karen Shepherd]

No.

As I said to the committee, there is something I would like some direction or advice on. On the reports that may come up or may be finalized in the summer, like the investigative reports for example, my thinking is that if a report is finished sometime in the summer and the House and Senate aren't sitting, these are something I should probably hold to the fall, when both houses are back, rather than finding a way to table by the back door. That's something you could get back to me on.