Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 5th, 2010

[Lyne Robinson-Dalpé]

You can rest assured. Following your request, we contacted whips from other political parties to let them know it was unacceptable for their members to receive coverages.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

To get back to the Dykstra affair, you say that a fundraising activity was involved. If it had not been a fundraising event, something might have been amiss. Am I right?

[Nancy Bélanger]

I'm not sure what you're hinting at. Usually, in the case of a fundraising activity, the riding association handles everything. All the funds and all the contributions go directly to that constituency. In addition, the Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons contains a provision stating that any benefits a person receives directly from his or her constituency are excluded from the definition of advantages and benefits. Basically, since the event was organized by the riding association, it was not really subject to the code.

What you are perhaps referring to may be related to the act. Pursuant to the act, Mr. Dykstra, as parliamentary secretary, cannot solicit funds that could give rise to a conflict of interest. However, the code doesn't deal with that. Because he solicited funds while serving as parliamentary secretary, we had to check whether his actions gave rise to a conflict of interest, and we concluded that was not the case.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you.

Mr. Siksay, welcome. It's your turn.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Thank you, Chair. It's good to be here, although I'm very surprised to be here this morning as well. I do apologize; because I came in late I may be covering ground that other people have covered, and I'm not as prepared as I'd like to be.

Commissioner, in your statement today and in some of the reports that you've mentioned, you've talked about the possibility of needing new fundraising guidelines both for members of Parliament and for cabinet ministers and parliamentary secretaries. In your statement this morning, you've listed some of the things that you think might be covered. I wonder if you could expand on those this morning and tell us in more detail about what you think might be appropriate.

[Mary Dawson]

I've pointed out in my observations in the Dykstra report what my colleague was just mentioning. There is a rule against fundraising in the act for reporting public office holders, which includes ministers and parliamentary secretaries, but there's no similar rule in the code. It's for consideration as to whether members want those kinds of rules, but certainly it does create perceptions of conflicts, potentially.

There's a number of approaches one could take, from an absolute prohibition against fundraising on the part of any members to perhaps a prohibition against fundraising for members who are also ministers and parliamentary secretaries, because sometimes it's very difficult to figure out whether they're behaving as a minister, or a parliamentary secretary, or a member. It would certainly simplify the rule if it just applied to ministers whenever they're operating, whether as a member or as a minister, for example, or a parliamentary secretary. It's in that area that I thought some thought could be given to this.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Do you know of other jurisdictions that have those kinds of prohibitions against fundraising for elected officials?

[Mary Dawson]

Do you know what? I'm not sure. I probably did know at one time, but I've forgotten.

Does anybody remember?

Generally speaking, I think our regimes are quite stringent as compared to most. I would bet that there would be some other jurisdictions that have those fundraising regimes, but I've forgotten.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

In both the Raitt report and the Dykstra report, I believe you mentioned that there were new guidelines being prepared or that the government or the Prime Minister's Office had promulgated something, but it hadn't been made public yet. Can you say more about that or what the circumstances are there?

[Mary Dawson]

What I can say is that I mentioned in the Raitt report that I had been given a copy of guidelines that had been given to ministers by the Prime Minister, and I went on to say, why not make them public?

That's the top and bottom of it, I think.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

There hasn't been any response to your suggestion that those guidelines be made public?

[Mary Dawson]

Actually, I think I saw something in the press yesterday about that. It was just in my report; I didn't send a letter. But it's an observation: I thought, why not make them public?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Dawson, a number of times you have raised the whole question of your mandate and the fact that ethics doesn't appear anywhere in anything that deals with your job other than the job title, and that this often puts you in a bind, with the expectations that arise from it. Has anybody bitten on something that would clear up that problem or would take that pressure off you? I'm sure you feel it as a pressure, because everybody expects you to do something, but sometimes, you say, it just isn't in your mandate.

How can we fix that problem?

[Mary Dawson]

I'm trying to fix it by making clear what my mandate is.

The other thing I'm trying to do is this. In my later inquiry and examination reports I go on to make some observations and make clear that it's not the assessment under the code or the act that I'm making, and it doesn't bear necessarily on whether the person has contravened one of those vehicles. But I will go on and make observations if things are potentially problematic or put members in a bad light.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

So you're pushing at that definition by making those observations, which go beyond. I suspect you push until you get push-back on those kinds of things. Would it be helpful to drop the word “ethics” from your job title?

[Mary Dawson]

I don't really care.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Okay. So you think that's a dynamic that's always going to be there in that position, and that there will be that expectation, or...?

[Mary Dawson]

Yes. I mean, it was described in those kind of terms. Conflict of interest is an ethical issue, and “ethics” seems to be more readily understood by people than “conflict of interest”. The problem is that ethics is a very broad field, and certainly the aspects that I have to deal with are not the whole range of ethical issues.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

I'm just struggling, because I know you raise it regularly, and so I suspect it is something you struggle with constantly.

[Mary Dawson]

I think it's part of my method of making people understand where my mandate begins and ends.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Okay.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Ms. Foote, you're up.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Thank you.

Welcome, Mrs. Dawson. It's good to have you back.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I'm sorry; I forgot to mention that we're into five-minute rounds.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Well, welcome anyway.

I want to go back to the conflict of interest screen. I'm curious about how specific those screens are.

With respect to Mr. Wright, I'm wondering, because of his involvement with Onex, whether that is something that would be up on the screen. Onex is the parent company of Raytheon Canada, which we know is a defence and aerospace company that actively lobbies the government on defence and aerospace issues, including multi-million dollar defence procurement files such as the Arctic offshore patrol ships, fixed-wing search and rescue, joint supply ships, new fighter aircraft, and other programs, so—