Information & Ethics Committee on Jan. 30th, 2024

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Good morning. I call the meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 99 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(h) and the motion adopted by the committee on Wednesday, January 17, 2024, the committee is meeting today for a briefing session with the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely by using the Zoom application.

I would like to remind all members not to put their earpieces next to the microphones, as it causes feedback and potential injury to our interpreters.

I would now like to welcome our witnesses for today.

First, from the Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, I welcome Mr. Konrad von Finckenstein, who is the interim Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner. I would also like to welcome again Lyne Robinson-Dalpé, who is the director, advisory and compliance.

Welcome again, sir, to the committee. You have five minutes to address the committee, and we'll follow that with questions by members.

Go ahead, sir.

[Konrad von Finckenstein, Interim Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I hope the microphone is working now. We had problems the last time.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Yes.

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

Okay.

Thank you for inviting me to answer your questions about the rules for gifts including vacations and travel under the Conflict of Interest Act.

With me is Lyne Robinson‑Dalpé, director of advisory and compliance at the Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner.

As you all appreciate, the Conflict of Interest Act is guided by four principles.

The first principle is disclosure. Upon appointment under the act, all reporting public office holders must disclose within 60 days their assets and other relevant information to the commissioner. This forms the basis for the compliance process and will be the source of ongoing conversations throughout the appointment of a public office holder.

The second principle is advice. As part of the compliance process, the commissioner gives confidential advice as to what measures are required to ensure compliance. These measures may vary, but can include public disclosure, divestment, recusal or even a conflict of interest screen.

During the tenure of the public office holders, open discussions and disclosures allow the office to help manage conflicts of interest and safeguard public confidence.

The third principle is confidentiality.

All interactions with the commissioner are confidential and can only be released by the public office holder, not by me.

The confidentiality provision allows public office holders to fully disclose their situation and enables the commissioner to make a decision based upon all relevant facts.

The fourth principle is transparency. Transparency is a keystone for engendering public confidence. The act strikes a balance between maximum transparency and confidentiality to protect the privacy of public office holders. Redacted versions of relevant disclosures of recusals, gifts or results of investigations are published on the office's website. The office's public registry is the most frequently accessed part of our website.

Let's move on now to the matter at hand, which is the Prime Minister's recent trip to Jamaica, which sparked your request for this information meeting about the rules regarding gifts, including vacations and travel.

The act defines gifts in subsection 11(1) as follows:

No public office holder or member of his or her family shall accept any gift or other advantage, including from a trust, that might reasonably be seen to have been given to influence the public office holder in the exercise of an official power, duty or function.

Clearly, the granting of hospitality—namely, allowing somebody to use a property without charge—is a gift. However, there is an exception.

However, there is an exception for acceptable gifts in paragraph 11(2)(b), which reads as follows:

11(2) … a public office holder or member of his or her family may accept a gift or other advantage (b) that is given by a relative or friend

Now let's look at the facts in this case. What's in the public domain? I shall try to be as forthright as possible with you, as far as the act allows.

The Prime Minister has stated that he—Mr. Green—is a friend of the family. He has been a friend for over 50 years. He has stayed at Mr. Green's property since he was a child. The Prime Minister has received gifts—one of hospitality—more than once from this friend. He has spoken publicly of this friendship and has sought advice from my office, both through my tenure and through the tenure of my predecessor.

While the act speaks of “advice”, the advice we give is really tantamount to a ruling. Let's not kid around: Public office holders always accept our advice. Advice is given to ensure public office holders are in compliance with the act; if they do not follow the advice, then there will be an investigation.

We have no role to pre-clear gifts from family and from friends under the act, nor do we approve travel destinations. However, we give advice as to whether a gift is acceptable or not. We work to verify the true depth of an asserted friendship. If someone is a friend, if they can offer a gift to a public officer in a personal context, then the gift does not need to be disclosed. The last point is important because subsection 25(5) of the act provides that:

If a reporting public office holder or a member of his or her family accepts...any gift or other advantage that has a value of $200 or more, other than one from a relative or friend, the reporting public officer holder shall, within 30 days after accepting the gift or other advantage, make a public declaration that provides sufficient detail to identify the gift or other advantage accepted, the donor and the circumstances under which it was accepted.

Now 30 days have passed since the Prime Minister disclosed that he went to Jamaica. Nothing has been published on our website. From the facts that I gave you and the provisions of the law, you can draw your own conclusions as to the advice that I gave and what happened.

I, under law, cannot give you any more, but I've tried to outline for you as clearly as possible the provisions of the law, the facts in the public domain and the situation. I'm bound by the confidentiality of the act, but I will try to answer your questions to the best of my abilities.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, sir, for your opening statement.

Before we begin with our round of questioning, let us note that we have the interim Ethics Commissioner, Ms. Robinson-Dalpé, here for two hours. In the past, what we've done is reset the clock at the top of the hour to allow Mr. Villemure and Mr. Green their additional time. Do I have the consensus of the committee to do the same today?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Okay, good.

We're going to start with our first round of questioning. Mr. Barrett, you have six minutes. Go ahead, please.

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

Good morning. Thank you very much for joining us.

You've said that your office does not pre-approve vacations. That's contrary to the statements that have been made by representatives of the Prime Minister. Specifically, the government House leader said that the vacation was pre-approved. To be clear, do you pre-approve vacations by designated public office holders?

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

I just read you the provisions of the law.

I give advice. I give advice, and when asked questions about conflict, we give the answer. The office-holder can describe that advice in whichever way he wants to refer to it. In this case, they called it “pre-clearance”. That's not a term I would have used. What we did was advise him on the propriety of his trip to Jamaica.

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

The—

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

As you know, it's in the public domain that he consulted us and we advised him.

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

Okay.

The Prime Minister has offered three separate public statements on this matter as to the disclosure to your office. Are you able to share with us if it was the first, second or third version of events that representatives of Mr. Trudeau provided to Canadians? Can you say which one he consulted you on?

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

No, I cannot. As I pointed out, it's confidential. I'm not responsible for the spokesman of the Prime Minister and the way he characterizes our interaction.

I can only tell you what happened: They consulted us: we gave advice; they went to Jamaica.

If it had not been an acceptable gift, it would have had to be reported on our website. Thirty days have passed, and nothing has been reported.

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

Are you satisfied that the gift of the $84,000 vacation was one from a friend and not from an entity like a corporation or a company?

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

As I mentioned, we verify allegations of friendship. We do our research, and the fact is that it was disclosed publicly by the Prime Minister. What we found is coincident with the fact that this is a true friend who has no relations with the Government of Canada.

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

I appreciate that, but let me be a bit more precise. It's not a question to me if they're friends. The question is, who gave the gift?

I'll give an example. If a prime minister is friends with, let's say, Ted Rogers, and if it's established and been ruled on by your office that a prime minister is friends with this individual, and if that designated public office holder then receives free wireless services from Rogers Communications Inc. in perpetuity as a gift from the friend, and the friend is not incurring the expense and the corporation is forgoing revenue, is that an acceptable gift from a friend?

If it is not, has your office been satisfied in this case that the gift was in fact paid for by Mr. Green and was not just revenue that was forgone by a company that Mr. Green has an interest in?

I ask because I don't see them the same way.

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

First of all, I don't answer hypothetical questions, so let's forget that. What you're trying to get at is really whether it has to be the friend himself who is giving that gift or whether it could be an entity that the friend controls. Frankly, it makes no difference if the friend didn't have control over the entity that provided it. In the case here, whether it's Mr. Green or Mr. Green's hotel that gave it, he was the controlling mind. He gave it, so that's what counts. It's the friendship that triggered it.

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

Then is revenue that is forgone by a corporation that is owned by an individual an acceptable gift?

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

It's not a question of....

You are trying to get me into income tax issues here. That is not the issue at all. The issue is whether this gift, in any way, puts forward a situation in subsection 11(1), which I have pointed out, and I read it out to you. It's something “that might reasonably be seen to have been given to influence the public office holder”.

Is the effect here, under the complaint, that somebody gave a gift to the Prime Minister, who is his personal friend, that is likely to influence the behaviour of the Prime Minister? That's really the question we're looking at. Whether the gift was given by Mr. Green or by the company that he controls doesn't affect us. We know what the gift was, and it has been publicly disclosed.

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

Right.

We know now that a gift was given. Initially, the Prime Minister said that he was staying at his own expense, that this was a personal expense he was incurring. Then, when pressed, his story changed. This is what gave rise to concern by Canadians.

Of course, it's not something that you control, as you said—

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

It's also totally irrelevant.

If he had paid, there would be no issue. If he accepts it from a friend, it's also okay.

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

With due respect, sir, if the Prime Minister or his spokespeople lied to Canadians when he said he paid for something, that's what gave rise to the public interest in this issue.

I'm not looking for you to pronounce on the morals of someone who lies or doesn't, but what we don't know is what the Prime Minister told you. That's the challenge that's come forward. We can't take him at his word, because he's given three different versions of events to Canadians. That's, frankly, not acceptable.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

Ms. Khalid, you have six minutes.

[Iqra Khalid, Liberal, Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I would like to follow up on some of the questioning of Mr. Barrett.

I really appreciate, Commissioner, that you've said that if it had not been an acceptable gift, it would have been reported on our website in 30 days. It has been 30 days, and nothing has been reported.

I want to pick up on some of the issues that Mr. Barrett outlined in more of a contextual basis.

The last time you were here, we talked about the strange case of five Conservative MPs who took a lavish trip to London in the summer of 2023. Included in the expenses were $600 in bottles of champagne, as well as porterhouse steaks, chateaubriand and smoked salmon. It cost over $6,200 for one night out for dinner. These expenses also included a $360 Uber ride.

Their expenses and their travel were paid for by an organization that was created by one of the MPs, Mr. John Williamson, who was on this trip with them, except that specific MPs' bills were paid by a Hungarian think tank.

At the time, you said that this would “seem to smell” and that you did not like that situation at all. The Lobbying Commissioner also said that this was an issue of concern. Do you still agree that this did not pass the smell test?

[Konrad von Finckenstein]

What you're talking about now is sponsored travel by MPs. You have a code of conduct for MPs that specifically accepts sponsored travel. It provides for it. It says, “...a member may accept, for the member and guests of the member, sponsored travel that arises from or relates to his or her position.” Then, if it is more than $200, it has to be disclosed. That's the provision there.

I have absolutely nothing to say about the amount, the propriety or anything that's there. You have adopted rules by which you specifically said that sponsored travel is okay as long as it is disclosed.