Finance Committee on Nov. 24th, 2020

[Mario Dion]

Mr. Chairperson, I'm afraid that I will once again disappoint members of the committee by saying that whether a public office holder—whether it's the Prime Minister or a much more junior one—consults us or doesn't consult us is something that is private between the person in question and my office. There are clear provisions in the act that any advice we give to a public office holder is confidential and that I'm not at liberty to discuss it.

The obligation to recuse oneself belongs to the public office holder. Section 21 of the act makes that very clear. We recommend that people, when in doubt, should consult with us. In fact, I gave an information session recently to 250 people in which I made clear the point that one should consult, first, because we are more specialized and, second, because we also are more objective when it comes to telling or recommending a course of action to them. However, at the end of the day, the person is accountable for his or her decision to recuse or not to recuse himself or herself.

I hope this answers your question. We did seek all relevant documents, including cabinet documents, and we have received them.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

However, you're unable to confirm that there were two cabinet discussions around this issue. Mr. Shugart did testify to that effect.

[Mario Dion]

Not at this stage, no.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thank you.

This is the public domain, so we're not revealing any confidences. The former finance minister admitted just this summer—again, before all of the committees were shut down by the Prime Minister—that he had not read the conflict of interest rules.

Do you suggest that all cabinet ministers, in fact, all members of Parliament, should pay strict attention to conflict of interest rules and should actually be reading those rules and regulations so that they understand their responsibilities?

[Mario Dion]

There is no doubt in my mind that anybody appointed to a senior public office should take the time to review the short Conflict of Interest Act. We're talking about 60-some sections. We're not talking about reading the Income Tax Act or the Criminal Code of Canada. It's entirely feasible. It's not plain language, but it's actually understandable. We also have, on our website, interpretation bulletins on several of the obligations under the act.

So, by all means, there is no question in my mind. In fact, my advice has been, before being the Ethics Commissioner—because I was a senior public office holder for something like 25 years before that—to read it once a year. Don't only read it upon becoming a public office holder, but once a year. It gives you some assurance that you actually remember the various obligations that you have under these instruments.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Yes, that's good advice to all members of cabinet, I think, moving forward.

We had testimony before this committee on July 28 by the Kielburger brothers. They clarified that payments for auxiliary events, where donors and potential donors get to sit and meet with some of the talent, were part of the WE Day charities.

I'm interested in knowing whether that information.... This isn't the public office holder communicating with you, but were you aware of WE's approach and these auxiliary event payments? Is that something that your office would be aware of that might involve public office holders or their families?

[Mario Dion]

We are now aware, and it will of course be reviewed in our report.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

But you weren't aware previously, so that was new information, was it?

[Mario Dion]

Again, what is brought to our attention and what is not brought to our attention is, I'm afraid, a matter of confidence between ourselves and the Prime Minister, the minister, or anybody else with whom the office deals.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

This will be a last question, Mr. Julian.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Finally, what advice do you have for the Prime Minister and the government regarding these issues around conflict of interest, which have happened in repetition? You've certainly been able numerous times to judge the issue around conflict of interest. What would be your suggestion, moving forward, for the government to avoid having these problems occur yet again?

[Mario Dion]

We've already discussed the fact that one should read periodically the Conflict of Interest Act. It's not a well-known fact, but under section 23 of the act I have the authority to provide the Prime Minister with confidential advice as to what should be done either in a specific case or in general.

There is, then, a tool whereby I can make my views known to the Prime Minister, but again it's confidential.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Okay, thank you both.

We'll go on to Mr. Poilievre, who will be followed by Mr. Baker, in two five-minute rounds, unless someone wants to split their time.

Mr. Poilievre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

To clarify with you, Mr. Commissioner, I understood your earlier testimony to be that the government has handed you over the same 5,000 pages of documents that it handed over to the committee.

Was that your testimony?

[Mario Dion]

No. My testimony was that we didn't try to compare what we received with what the committee had received. I'm thus in no position to compare, but we seem to have received slightly more pages.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

More pages.

[Mario Dion]

Yes.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

I would like to ask on behalf of the committee that you perform that comparison and report back to us so that we might ascertain whether or not we have received all the documents we should receive. Would you commit to doing that?

[Mario Dion]

Maybe we didn't ask for the same documents. Maybe we asked for a much wider set of documents. That could explain the discrepancy.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Would you be willing to report back to us on a comparison between what we've received and what you've received?

[Mario Dion]

What I'll do is discuss it with my staff to determine the workload associated with doing so, because I would not want this to detract from our finalizing reports as soon as possible.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You're saying that you had no redactions or exclusions in the package that you received?

[Mario Dion]

That's what I said. That's right.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

That is very strange.

[Mario Dion]

Except for material that did not pertain.... Sometimes you have a document in which 90% is about the subject at hand—