Information & Ethics Committee on July 22nd, 2020

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I believe the sentiment being expressed by the member opposite has been discussed at length, so I would simply suggest that we move forward to a vote as quickly as possible.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Thank you, Mr. Kurek.

Mr. Fergus.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Again, Madam Chair, I would like to stress that I do not agree with the committee's decision on the subamendment for reasons that I have been arguing for quite some time. I'm not going to raise them again.

I feel we are making a big mistake here. If we start asking for documents about a member's legal or business past to find out who did what and whether it has anything to do with the machinery of government, where will it end? I believe we are setting a really bad precedent here.

I was prepared to support this approach, and I said loud and clear that this information should be forwarded directly to the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, as he is the designated person to conduct this type of review. I still support that approach. If we leave the door wide open to the potential smearing of the reputations of honourable members of Parliament, their family members and their friends, where will it end? It's an important question to ask.

We should turn this over to the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner. No one can say that the commissioner is reluctant to stand up to power. He has been in the position for two and a half years, and in that time, he has demonstrated that he has no hesitation whatsoever in making decisions or making his opinion and findings known after an investigation. It's better that he, rather than we, be in charge of that. If politicians are asked to monitor other politicians, how far are they going to go? Can their impartiality always be guaranteed when they do this kind of study?

It's a bad idea. It is, however, a decision the committee has made. I will certainly continue to ask questions about it. This really does not sit well with me, but if we want to limit the damage, the least we can do—as we agreed when we set up this committee, in this Parliament, in February—is to discuss the documents we obtain in camera, so that we do not—although we have already done so—overstep our responsibilities or allow abuses to take place.

So I am making a plea to you in moving that this information be considered in camera. That way, we could at least limit the damage we are about to cause.

I therefore support my colleague's subamendment.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Thank you.

Mr. Fergus was last on the speakers list. Seeing no other speakers, we'll move to a vote.

The vote, then, is that any examination would be done in camera.

Perhaps the clerk wouldn't mind just reading it officially.

[The Clerk]

The subamendment reads that any examination of personal documents by this committee be done in camera.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

It's that any examination of those documents, the documents we're referring to in the motion, be done in camera.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Does that work, if we say “the documents referred to”?

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Yes...that the documents referred to be done in camera.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Can we get a recorded vote, Madam Chair?

(Subamendment agreed to: yeas 6; nays 4)

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

We'll move on to the amendment.

Mrs. Shanahan the floor is yours.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Can you read it again for me please?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

I will have the clerk read the amendment, now with two subamendments added to it.

[The Clerk]

The amendment reads that the motion be amended by adding, after the words “one week of the adoption of this Order”, the following: “and that the clerk provide these records to the members of the committee and the Ethics Commissioner for study; and that any examination by this committee of the documents referred to be done in camera; and that this committee calls upon Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to appear to give testimony relating to these matters.”

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

I have nothing further to add.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

My speakers list then is Mr. Fergus, followed by Madame Gaudreau.

Go ahead, Mr. Fergus.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Madam Chair, even with this amendment, I still think it is a wrong move for us to make. I will be voting against the amendment, and the main motion, if the amendment were to pass.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Moving down the list, we have Madame Gaudreau, followed by Mr. Vaughan.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Based on all our discussions, thoughts and conversations, I believe we are ready to vote. I will leave it at that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Mr. Vaughan.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

I'll be voting against it. I think the notion of a parallel investigation concerns me deeply. The integrity of the Ethics Commissioner and the work that independent officer of Parliament does is profoundly important. The idea of competing opinions on interpretation of evidence simultaneously as that independent officer goes forward, I just think is wrong. I think it undermines, as I said, a very strong ethical framework that Parliament has put in place to hold us accountable, because we know that's, unfortunately, a necessary part of any parliamentary process. I wish it weren't true.

The issue that is in front of us is how to, I would hope, make the ethical framework, the rules of conflict of interest and rules of integrity clear and stronger so that future parliamentarians are framed with an independent, principled way of finding information, assessing facts and, if necessary, taking action to hold members accountable. It was a deliberate decision of past Parliaments not to have parliamentarians do this for good reasons, and I am deeply concerned about this.

I don't think it's inappropriate to have the Prime Minister here, as I said in my comments, to answer questions as to what's happened. That's not the point I was making. The point I was making and the concern I had, and the concern I still have with what's being decided here today, is this notion of a simultaneous parallel process to the Ethics Commissioner's. What happens if this committee reaches a separate set of conclusions than the Ethics Commissioner? What does the Ethics Commissioner do? Have we not undermined the independence of that office?

I think we need to think about that, not in the context of the current timetable or framework in which we sit, but I think we need to think about that in the context of the next situation that comes along. Do we want independent oversight of parliamentary processes as they relate to both cabinet members and backbenchers, any member elected to the House of Commons, or are we going to constantly have a committee that will be able to call a member, accuse a member, demand evidence of the member, display that evidence to the public and then reach a conclusion that has no consequence whatsoever because the Ethics Commissioner hasn't been involved?

There's a reason why opposition parties went to the Ethics Commissioner first. That's the process. That's the appropriate process, and that's the process we've agreed to as parliamentarians. We're changing that today. We're not changing it based on strengthening an overall ethical framework or accountability mechanisms. We're changing it because there's information in the public realm, and there is a political opportunity to exploit that in the committee setting. Let's be frank about it.

Of course you're going to get push-back from a political perspective, but I'm not speaking here from a political perspective or from a partisan perspective. I'm speaking here as a parliamentarian who takes the issue of ethics and accountability extraordinarily seriously, and I support wholeheartedly the notion of an independent office of Parliament doing this work.

History has shown us that there were pitfalls to politicizing accountability, instead of strengthening it, and this committee's job is not to go after members of Parliament. It's to set the rules by which parliamentarians are held accountable, and the decision in past Parliaments was to very clearly put that in the hands of an independent Ethics Commissioner. I have confidence in that commissioner, and certainly my experience as a parliamentarian over the last six years has seen that they have the capacity and the fortitude to speak truth to the power that parliamentarians hold and to hold us accountable through that process.

I have confidence in that, and I have a great deal of concern about the way in which this committee is reinterpreting its mandate and, in particular, the notion that there should be a parallel accountability process that could look very different from the one that gets delivered to us by the Ethics Commissioner, whose job it is to do a non-political, non-partisan interpretation of fact, present findings to Parliament and then move forward with accountability measures.

I support, as I said, getting all the information to the Ethics Commissioner. I think that's fundamental to a good decision, but I don't support simultaneously delivering it to other groups of parliamentarians so they can go off and do their work in different committees.

I have a great deal of reservation with regard to some of the things we made today, irrespective of which party we're talking about, irrespective of what issue we're talking about, from an ethical process, from a legal process of how we're handling this issue. I will just end with this: God help you if you find yourself in a situation where parliamentarians are suddenly swirling around your behaviour and you no longer have access to an independent Ethics Commissioner and instead it's just a partisan committee. That is not a good practice to be establishing.

I have made my point.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Thank you, Mr. Vaughan.

Mr. Fergus, you are last on the speaking list.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

I'm sorry, Madam Chair. I spoke a little precipitously. I will be voting for the amendment, but I will be voting against the main motion in the end.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

Thank you, Mr. Fergus.

Excellent. Seeing no other speakers, I will move to a vote.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I'd like a recorded vote, Madam Chair.

(Amendment as amended agreed to: yeas 10; nays 0)

[The Chair, Conservative, Rachael Thomas]

At this point in time, we will proceed to our discussion of the motion as it stands amended. I will now have the clerk—who has been so gracious to us, I might add—read the motion with the approved amendment.

Once the clerk does that, the speaking list that has been preserved from our last day is as follows: Madame Gaudreau, Mr. Kurek, Mr. Fergus, Madame Brière and Madam Shanahan.