I'd say, unfortunately, not very much at all is working, although there was one improvement made by the new Ethics Commissioner, Mario Dion. The old Ethics Commissioner, whom you will be hearing from later today, Mary Dawson, had ruled, although it doesn't say this in the Conflict of Interest Act, that private interests are only financial interests, that they do not include political interests or social interests. There is nothing in the act to suggest that at all. In fact, the MP's code says that private interests are only financial interests, which points to the fact that if something wasn't included in the Conflict of Interest Act then Parliament didn't intend to limit it.
Thankfully, Mario Dion, with his ruling on the SNC-Lavalin scandal last summer, reversed that and said that interests include political, social and financial interests and there's a very broad definition. So that's a step forward but it's kind of an arbitrary step forward that could be reversed by the next commissioner. The definition of private interests, specifically, should be put in the act. Other than that, I don't think much is working.
You're going to hear from Mary Dawson. She let 85% of the people she reviewed off the hook, with secret rulings most of the time. The rulings do not have to be made public if she decides to drop an investigation, as she decided, for example, to drop the investigation into Nigel Wright and his financial conflicts of interest. We learned about that only because a reporter chased after her for a year until she finally admitted that she had just dropped that investigation. There are zero penalties for violating the key rules. Even for violating the administrative rules of disclosing your assets and liabilities accurately and on time, the maximum penalty is $500, which is not much incentive to a cabinet minister who is making more than $200,000 and a Prime Minister making more than $300,000.
I don't see much working at all. There is no statutory five-year review of the act required, but it should happen. A review of the Lobbying Act by this committee is now three years overdue. Both acts need to be reviewed together, and both need to be strengthened in the ways that I've outlined. You can see all the details in the—