Evidence of meeting #40 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was code.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:45 a.m.
Conservative
Bob Zimmer Conservative Prince George—Peace River, BC
That's pretty much it.
Do I have much time, Mr. Chair?
11:45 a.m.
Conservative
Bob Zimmer Conservative Prince George—Peace River, BC
I had another question on interpretation. What do you consider your role as Ethics Commissioner? Are you to interpret the act, or is your job to follow the act?
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I think it's the same thing. It's the code or the act we're talking about, I guess. My job is to interpret it and apply it. If there are broad provisions, I have to determine how to apply those broad provisions, and I try to be as transparent as I can be as to how I'm interpreting it.
11:50 a.m.
Conservative
Bob Zimmer Conservative Prince George—Peace River, BC
Coming back to what I asked, though, I guess that is the concern. I understand that there's a certain amount of interpretation in our jobs. You use strong language—“prohibition”—and then you have “interpretation”, which you yourself say you use. I guess it becomes a deep concern to us to give you even more power to interpret and to act on that.
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I invite you to make any exceptions or to have more precision in your code as you feel necessary. What I'm doing is telling you the way I'm interpreting now. This is an opportunity, if you don't like the way I'm interpreting it, to narrow it in some way or to establish some exceptions. Maybe you don't want receptions covered at all, or whatever.
This is the same thing I went through when we got the rules for the gifts changed a couple of years ago. Those gift rules from two or three years ago said that you couldn't receive a gift. There was no conflict test. Nobody was ever telling me about receiving their gifts, so I said that this was a farce. I didn't want to be administering an act nobody was complying with.
It's better to narrow it a bit and have at least a comprehensible rule. I'm saying that if you want to narrow it some more in some way, go ahead.
11:50 a.m.
Conservative
May 31st, 2012 / 11:50 a.m.
NDP
Alexandrine Latendresse NDP Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Thank you kindly, Mr. Chair.
Thank you for submitting your report.
I want to start by saying that we are on your side. We really do want to see the code and the act made better. We feel it is critical to hold members and ministers to a very high ethical standard. That is absolutely paramount.
Where I think the problem lies when you talk about friends—and it has already come up a lot—is really in the limit. As mentioned, it is obviously very easy to determine who is a family member. I understand your position: for you, it is very limited.
At the same time, however, it becomes difficult for me, as a member, to read the code and know precisely when an acquaintance has entered the realm of friendship sufficiently that I need to disclose a conflict of interest to the commissioner. So it becomes rather tough to understand how you are supposed to navigate that. I don't quite know the best way to define it clearly so we don't inadvertently end up in a conflict of interest situation.
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I don't have the definition set out in the act with me, but it is rather narrow and specific.
11:50 a.m.
Nancy Bélanger General Counsel, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
It is regular social interactions. It's pretty much bottom line. It's more than an acquaintance or somebody you've met through professional association. It's someone with whom you've had sort of a long-standing relationship and who you see regularly. That's pretty much it.
11:50 a.m.
NDP
Alexandrine Latendresse NDP Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
You said there were five inquiries in the past few years. The outcome was two breaches and three non-breaches. Is that correct?
11:50 a.m.
NDP
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Mr. Maertens, could you answer that please?
11:50 a.m.
Director, Reports and Investigations, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I don't know the exact number, but it was somewhere between 20 and 30.
11:50 a.m.
Director, Reports and Investigations, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Those had to do with the code. There were also numerous complaints under the act. We're talking about 60 or so.
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
On the whole, I believe there were 100 complaints, were there not?
11:50 a.m.
Director, Reports and Investigations, Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Yes.
11:50 a.m.
NDP
Alexandrine Latendresse NDP Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
How do you determine when a complaint does not warrant an inquiry? Does it have to do with the complaint being inadmissible or outside your mandate?
11:50 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
Normally, either the complaint is outside our mandate because we don't have the necessary authority, or there is no evidence. There must be reasonable grounds to believe that a breach occurred. The complaints that we get are often not based on reasonable grounds.
11:55 a.m.
NDP
Alexandrine Latendresse NDP Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Given the recommendation of our previous chair, do you think it would be sufficiently acceptable to require the organization hosting the reception to notify you of the event and the guests invited?
11:55 a.m.
Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner
I have to think about that. I don't have any jurisdiction over those companies or people; they aren't bound by the code. It could be a bit tricky. I am not quite sure how we could do that.
