Government Operations Committee on March 27th, 2007

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

Thank you, Ms. Thibault, for your questions. I believe there were two of them. I will begin with your question regarding the Immigration and Refugee Board.

Following discussions with the clerk, we were asked to define the board's mandate and review its procedures. The mandate had been approved by the minister at that time, and we did an analysis in order to ascertain whether effective changes could be made to the procedure implemented in 2004. This report was published and made available on the immigration department website. After consulting experts involved in the procedure and after hearing testimony from the members in order to understand the complexity of their jobs, we made recommendations to the minister.

Our primary objective was to consult with the directors of agencies in order to compare the various procedures and ascertain whether or not we could improve them. These consultations enabled us to draft, in cooperation with them, a series of principles which eventually were to be applied to these procedures. I do hope that these principles will be used as a basis for drafting a code of practice. However, it was not up to the secretariat to draft such a code. I am speaking specifically about the principles that we developed. First of all, we had to respect the prerogative of the governor in council. We were tasked with reviewing the governor in council decision-making process.

Then, in conjunction with the organizations and crown corporations, we developed a principle which we felt was very important and which was also important for our counterparts in other jurisdictions, including British Columbia and the United Kingdom: the principle of proportionality. I am mentioning this because this is a very important tool.

When it is time to staff one of these positions, it is obvious that there is a difference between appointing an individual who will be a member on a steering committee that meets three times a year and that of a CEO of a Crown corporation, for instance. The very important principle that we developed during the course of our consultations was to see how this could be applied in practical terms.

You have to start by developing principles and then discussing the ability of the nominees to fulfil their roles, and to have procedures that are both transparent and fair. There is also the principle stating that appointments should be made in an acceptable time period because, at times, there can be long periods of time—

[Louise Thibault, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I am going to interrupt you because I am sure that the chair is going to warn me that I have only one minute remaining. We only have seven minutes. Do I still have a minute left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

You have one minute remaining.

[Louise Thibault, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I'm going to interrupt you because I would like to discuss something that concerns us. Would the criteria you developed guarantee, to parliamentarians and all citizens, that the process will be as watertight as possible, so that there would not be any room for partisan or ideological appointments? I am not referring only to the current minority government, but any government that wants to leave its mark.

Would that enable us to have a process that is truly transparent and not biased so as to give an advantage to people who share our points of view?

[Peter Harrison]

Madam Chair, the objective is to ensure that the process is transparent. The individuals whose names are suggested to the governor in council must be able to fulfil the role that we want to give to them.

This is a process based on a decision made by the governor in council. The appointments are made by the ministers. Hence we were going to propose an approach, should there ever be a commission, that would enable us to have the names of competent individuals so that all ministers could submit that to the cabinet for approval.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Mr. Poilievre has the floor.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

I would like to thank our witness for coming.

Mr. Harrison, at this point, how close is the secretariat to completing its work in developing the code you spoke of earlier?

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

Thank you.

Madam Chair, we did what we could as professionally and efficiently as possible in the time available. I'm talking about the past, because I've not been involved in this for the last several months, as I was appointed elsewhere, but I believe we did very effective groundwork.

In order to move on a code of practice, the secretariat, which is made up of officials, would need the guidance of the commission. The code of practices that we've looked at elsewhere vary significantly. There are some that are thick tomes of rules and regulations. The movement in a number of jurisdictions is to say the code should be something that is extremely understandable, practical, and meets the objectives, some of which I laid out a minute ago. But the kind of code that the commissioners would like is a decision for the commission to make.

On the role of the secretariat, as in any supportive group—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

How far along are we in setting up this commission?

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

I'm told the government is in the process of considering the naming of commissioners. The orders in council to create the commission are in place. It's a question that would need to be answered by the government.

I think the secretariat work that we did is in sufficient order to be able to move quickly so that the commission can begin its job.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Right. I think there's a misperception that the government is going to nominate people who will work against the agenda that the government promised at election time. I think it's a misperception. There's a sense among some in the opposition that governments must not appoint people who agree with the government's agenda.

We were elected on a very clear platform in the last election. We've always been clear that we will be appointing people who will further the agenda. It's nothing new.

In fact, it's worth saying twice. We are going to appoint people who agree with the agenda that we intend to implement because we were elected on that agenda. This commission is designed to ensure that all the appointees are qualified.

Is that not your understanding of the commission's role?

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

If I may, Madam Chair, that is my understanding of the commission's role.

As I indicated in my opening statement, both the order in council that originally created it and Bill C-2 effectively give the commission an oversight role. The aim is to ensure there are processes in place that lead to the consideration of people who are qualified to do the job. It means there would have to be processes such that it is known that whoever comes forward can do the job.

The ultimate decision is made by the Governor in Council on the advice of the respective minister. It seems to me the decisions the ministers take, to which I have not been privy, will take into account the number of factors you've raised.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

That's right, and that is the clear distinction here. We are making qualified appointments. The previous Liberal government appointed its friends because they were friends, not because they were qualified.

We ran on a commitment in the last election that—

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

On a point of order, Madam Chair, that seems to be a rather partisan, broad, generalized statement.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Yes, it's partisan.

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

It's a point of debate. If you're going to throw that out, maybe you ought to justify it instead of wasting the witness's time with partisan—

[James Moore, Conservative, Port Moody—Westwood—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Debate, debate, debate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Thank you.

Let us go back to your time. You have a couple of minutes left.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Thank you.

The Liberals made appointments of unqualified individuals because they were Liberals, and we saw the outcome during the sponsorship scandal.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

You campaigned against that, don't you remember?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

We saw individuals in high places who were appointed because they were tightly associated with the government, not because they were qualified, and the consequences of that have been clear. So what we are trying to establish with this public appointments commission is a system that appoints qualified people to positions of public interest. Is that your understanding?

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

Thank you.

As I indicated in my opening comments, where I quoted the legislation, the role of the commission will be to ensure that there are processes in place that lead to the consideration of qualified people for Governor-in-Council appointments.

The commission would, I do believe, having developed a code of practice, ensure, because it has the role of oversight, that there are in place processes to bring that about.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Excellent, because we have a democratic agenda on which we were elected, and it would not be democratic to have people in positions trying to undermine that agenda that was voted in favour of by the electors of this country.

Is that a fair interpretation?

[Garth Turner, Conservative, Halton, ON]

Yes, is that fair? Is that your interpretation?

[Dr. Peter Harrison]

Madam Chair, I seek guidance from you.