I think this is an unfortunate but necessary reality to confront. I'm not sure that raising the stakes of monetary penalties against potential complainants is a sensible way to do this, but a balanced middle ground is having a measure of transparency where an ethics commissioner can exercise some judgment on disclosing, for example, the fact of an investigation, that it hasn't been complete, that there is no finding until that investigation is complete, and that it would be imprudent to comment further on specific allegations or evidence.
I think, ultimately, if there is someone who is vexatious, who brings complaint after complaint, or brings a complaint and tries to exploit it in the media, that it can be considered by the Ethics Commissioner as part of an overall discretion to ensure the integrity of her process. There should be a full panoply of measures at her disposal to ensure that her office is not used for improper partisan purposes.
There are things that can be done that are measured and balanced, but, again, you have to start from the proposition that this commissioner has to be above the fray, and has to be seen to be above the fray. If the commissioner doesn't have that credibility, doesn't have that confidence, then no provision in the statute and no amount of discretion or remedial sanction is going to make any difference. That has to be the point of departure.