Evidence of meeting #9 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was code.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:30 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Until I knew.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
You could, in fact, rule before the RCMP made public any charges or disposed of an issue.
12:30 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Yes.
They would make public whether they were investigating when they felt it was appropriate. We wouldn't make that public through my office; it wouldn't be appropriate.
I would think it would become public knowledge at the same time that I found out.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
So you have no ability to find that out sooner. You would do the same investigation no matter what.
12:30 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Right.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Okay.
You often use the phrase “reasonable grounds” when you're talking about making a decision in these issues. How do you define “reasonable grounds”? What's your take on what reasonable grounds would be?
12:30 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
That's standard legal terminology, and it's full of “depending on the circumstances” issues. Reasonable grounds is a well-known legal term and reasonable grounds means reasonable grounds. It's very difficult to give you more than that.
How can I explain reasonable grounds? Reasonable grounds has a plethora of legal precedent behind it. It's just enough to make it appear that there are grounds to suspect or to believe. I don't know what else to say.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
One of the things that you would take into consideration is to make sure this wasn't vexatious or frivolous. Is that part of your decision-making in terms of reasonable grounds?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Right. There are requirements in both the act and the code that I should have an eye to whether something is frivolous or vexatious.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Now, with regard to your staffing, do you have the staff capacity to undertake investigations in a timely manner and to respond to emerging requests for investigation on emerging situations?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
As I mentioned in my opening remarks, we never know how many investigations we're going to be required to undertake, so we have to find a balance between having too many staff and too few staff. The way my office is organized, a number of people are involved at one level or other in helping with preparing reports and getting the investigations dealt with. When we're dealing with a lot of investigations, they move off other jobs. Our staff, to some extent, is flexible as to what they're working on.
So far, we're coping. We do have a lot of investigations under way at the moment, and they're complicated particularly by the fact that a number of them are under both the act and the code simultaneously, which have different rules. But we're coping at the moment with the number of staff we have.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Are you currently undertaking any self-initiated investigations?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Not at the moment.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
There are a number of sets of guidelines that pertain to members of Parliament, ministers, ministers of state, parliamentary secretaries, public office holders. We have a number of different definitions of public office holders through various pieces of legislation as well.
You deal with the MPs' code and the Conflict of Interest Act, but there is also a key document called Accountable Government, for which the Prime Minister is solely responsible for overseeing and taking action. Do you see the set of standards in that document as more comprehensive for public office holders, ministers and ministers of state, than either the MPs' code or the Conflict of Interest Act?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
No; it deals with different issues, in large measure.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Do you see the Prime Minister's ability to uphold or enforce that code as being a more streamlined process than you would have to go through under either the Conflict of Interest Act or the MPs' code?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I haven't studied that recently, but those are guidelines, I believe. It's a code, as opposed to being a piece of legislation. Off the top of my head, I don't think procedural matters are dealt with in those guidelines; it's more about rules or guidelines.
12:35 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
And is the Prime Minister solely responsible for enforcing them?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
The Privy Council Office is—anyway, the mechanisms of the government are.
April 22nd, 2010 / 12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Thanks very much, Commissioner and your colleagues, for being with us again today. Certainly we've heard a lot of interesting information, some of it a little confusing, but I think we're getting there.
I have been looking at your website and trying to keep track of the work and the reports coming out of your office. You talked a little bit in your opening remarks about your mandate. What gives you that mandate? What gives you the authority?
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
The act and the code, and the Parliament of Canada Act has something about it too.
12:35 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
I forgot to say that I'm going to be splitting my time with Madam Block.
In looking at your estimates, which are why you are here today, I too would like to commend you for the way you have been handling things within your department. It looks as though there have been a lot of accomplishments. As you said, you've been slowly ramping up to come to your full complement of staffing. I noticed, as my colleague pointed out, that your budget requests have remained the same, that you're not requesting anything else.
Is there anything you can think of that might cause a blip in this and that you haven't included? Do you see anything that may be coming up? And I'm not asking you to predict the future.
12:35 p.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
The only thing, or the big uncertainty that I mentioned, is the number of investigations I have to be involved in. There's an inherent uncertainty in that. So far, we're managing.
12:40 p.m.
Conservative
Patricia Davidson Conservative Sarnia—Lambton, ON
Okay.
We know your office was created through the Federal Accountability Act. You were set up in 2007, I believe.
