Government Operations Committee on Feb. 1st, 2021

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Again, maybe this is a question for Mr. Cutler. What are some other means that governments can use to cultivate “speak up” culture? We know, for example, that the Ontario Securities Commission uses compensation, for example, monetary rewards. Can you maybe talk about what other means governments can use to cultivate “speak up” culture?

[Allan Cutler]

One of the things used down in the U.S. is literally rewarding whistle-blowers. That's the Securities and Exchange Commission. One of the other two may want to talk about it a bit more, but it certainly has proven effective.

In Canada, we passed a law that said that if you reported anything to Canada Revenue, you could get up to 15%, but then they put a caveat into the law that said a person who has a criminal record can't get that 15%.

Mr. Bron and I are aware of a particular individual who has tons of knowledge, but because he was convicted in the States, he can't get that percentage to expose the crime in Canada. He actually says that if he crosses the border, they'd find a reason to arrest him. That shows you his belief in how the Canadian justice system works.

[Ian Bron]

I would add that when you're talking about rewards, you're often talking about financial crimes, and the amounts are very large. They overcome the fact that the person who blows the whistle in those situations is basically going to be unemployable in that industry, forever, after that.

However, if you're talking about government, it's a little harder. Offering somebody a little bit of money to fix problems might work in some circumstances, but it wouldn't work in all. I think we have to be thinking more about how to remove the stigma of speaking up inside the public service.

[Allan Cutler]

That's a good point.

[Ian Bron]

There's a real problem where, even to this day, there are misconceptions about what whistle-blowers' motives are and what they're blowing the whistle about—personal grievances and that sort of thing. That has to come from the top. If you treat the whistle-blower as somebody who is trying to help the organization instead of attacking it, I think you'd see a real sea change in the attitudes and the culture as well.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

That's interesting. I appreciate that.

I just have a question and I'm not sure if it was already touched upon in our discussions. Are the concerns you've highlighted and brought forward today similar to the concerns of provincial governments? Are we seeing this across municipal, provincial and federal governments in terms of the “speak up” culture or in terms of the lack of protections?

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Please be very quick, if you could, Mr. Bron.

[Ian Bron]

Absolutely. I've been analyzing all the laws across this country. They are all essentially identical. The loopholes are the same. They're sometimes better and sometimes worse, but basically it's the same problem across the country.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. Bron.

Thank you, Mr. Kusmierczyk.

We'll now go to Ms. Vignola for six minutes.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Bron, you have spoken a few times about how whistle-blowers in both the public and private sectors are afraid to reveal an unacceptable situation. When I think of the fear that holds back whistle-blowers and the sometimes major consequences for the individuals who come forward, I get the impression that these people feel intimidated and even harassed.

To protect these employees, is it necessary to strengthen the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act by building on workplace harassment legislation?

[Ian Bron]

That's a tricky question. Harassment is usually treated as a personal-level issue. It's usually treated through different channels. Harassment is a typical response to whistle-blowing. It's probably the most pernicious, because it's really hard to prove that somebody is harassing somebody else and that it's related to the whistle-blowing.

Harassment would be considered a form of reprisal and should be treated differently from.... I don't want to call it “garden variety” but that's kind of what I'm getting at. The people who control the harassment procedures are often implicated in the wrongdoing where the harassment is being used as a reprisal. Does that make sense?

Harassment is a standard reprisal technique. If you want a fair hearing on normal harassment, you can go through the normal processes to get it addressed. However, if the harassment is a response to whistle-blowing, often the leadership in the organization will be implicated. They are also controlling the harassment process, so they can derail it. It's a tricky problem.

I get where you're going with it, but that would have to be handled very carefully.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

I was simply trying to find ways to improve the act, in addition to the 2015 recommendations.

On November 4, the president of the Treasury Board Secretariat told our committee that the Government of Canada's InfoBase contains all the detailed financial information on COVID-19.

Mr. Holman, what do you think of this statement? Is all the information there? If not, what information is missing and what information should be there?

[Sean Holman]

If all the information is there, I certainly haven't had time to look at it all. What we know is that that's not the case. This goes to my earlier point. There's a whole bunch of information out there that government not only does not release, but also fails to collect. What we see time and time again from the federal government, and also provincial governments, is that in a variety of areas—not just COVID, but also in anything that government regulates and touches—we are simply not collecting the amount of information necessary to make good decisions.

It has gotten to the point where we often rely—and I'm thinking about health information here related to the pandemic—on other organizations to provide that information to us, because we simply don't have public servants who are doing that collection work.

I think what has happened in Canada is that we've gotten lazy when it comes to collecting the information that's necessary for good decision-making. What we need to do as a country is revisit that data collection process and really put in place some measures that require not just the federal government, but all levels of government, to collect better data than they do.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you.

My question is for all three witnesses, because you may be aware of some information that we don't have.

Do you know whether any whistle-blowers have come forward during the pandemic with regard to contracts, measures, and so on? If so, how did this whistle-blowing affect them?

[Ian Bron]

I'm aware of several cases. In a couple of the cases, after speaking, they didn't want to go public. They were too afraid that the consequences would be the loss of jobs, and in one case, that the entire firm they were working for might have to shut down.

Mr. Cutler probably has more.

[Allan Cutler]

Essentially it's the same. They do not want to speak out because of the consequences, and they see really heavy, negative consequences. Especially now, what happens if they lose their jobs? A lot of them, let's be blunt, have a family, young children, a mortgage. It's a leap of a lot of courage to step forward when they're risking everything, when their kids can't go to university because they can't afford it because they got fired. They have a lot of things to think about, especially now, and it's not getting better.

It's the culture. Everybody says they believe in whistle-blowing, until it affects their organization, and then they're like, “How do we shut them up?”

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you, Mr. Cutler and Ms. Vignola.

We'll go to Mr. Green for six minutes.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you.

To the Canadian COVID-19 Accountability Group, in your white paper.... Has the federal government responded to any of your recommendations?

[Ian Bron]

No.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I'm a new MP, and I'm looking back at the report that came out of this committee, “Strengthening the Protection of the Public Interest Within the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act”, a very fulsome document. I wonder, through you, Mr. Chair, to members present, if they would care to comment on whether or not they view that it might be within our committee's best interest to revisit our own committee's work and find an avenue, perhaps, to restate the recommendations coming out of this, and whether this would be a useful thing.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Are you asking for a response from the witnesses or from me?

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

I'm asking the witnesses. I'm wondering if they're seeing value in the past reports that this committee has done that were passed and then completely shelved by this government. I'm trying not to get agitated because, Mr. Chair, I'll share with you that in my own approach to try to get information out of this government during COVID...you'll recall the many filibusters we sat through in this room.

While I respect my political friends across the aisle in government, and I respect their ability to manoeuvre, I think it's incumbent upon us, particularly in this committee, given that we've gone around this issue before, that we look at reintroducing the findings of our past study and call on this government to take the recommendations not just of the white paper but of the work we've already done in this committee.

Maybe, Mr. Chair, through you to our clerk, are there any avenues within this committee to reintroduce the 2017 report on the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act?

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Mr. Clerk.

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Paul Cardegna]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The committee does have the option of readopting the report from 2017 and putting it back into the House. It could ask at that point for a government response if it wants. Alternatively, the committee could start a new study, hear from new witnesses, bring forward the testimony and the report from the previous session and create a new report as well. There are—

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Can I suggest through you, Mr. Chair, given the urgency that we have, that at the appropriate time we move to resubmit this study as a whole? It draws on it, but more specifically, in future meetings, we look at the best practices for all the issues that have been brought up here in these testimonies today.

Mr. Chair, through you in my remaining time here, I'm wondering what they would see as being the quickest, most efficient way to introduce the ombudsperson and what exactly that position would be, for the welfare of people tuning in, to be able to provide immediate oversight of COVID spending.

We can throw it to Mr. Holman or Mr. Bron.