As I stated before, I'm generally not a proponent of the administrative monetary penalties idea. You heard from various other proponents as to what they thought were appropriate levels, and the reasons why they favoured administrative monetary penalties. I think whatever the level is, $500 is obviously too low. My concern, again from the experience in the United States where there are very high fines and sanctions, is you create a legalistic structure and an antagonistic structure. From my experience in Ontario and seeing elsewhere, I think what you want to do is not create a regime where you are essentially creating an ethics officer or the conflict of interest commissioner who is another regulatory official. In this case, public office holders have to deal with this official in the same way that public companies have to deal with the Ontario Securities Commission or the Alberta Securities Commission.
If the goal of the Conflict of Interest Act, which was originally part of the Federal Accountability Act, is to foster accountability for the exercise of public power and to create an ethical environment in public office holders so that the public increases its confidence in public officials, then I think there are other ways you can do this that are more cooperative and are more positive than necessarily levying very large fines for non-compliance.