Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Sept. 30th, 2014

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

I have, and it should not matter. The sentence itself should not trigger the loss of pension; rather it should be the crimes that someone is charged with. In the case of Lavigne, for example, it was only, I believe, a six-month sentence for the various crimes that he was found guilty of. I don't believe the actual conviction should be a factor here, and that follows the spirit of the Nova Scotia law, as well. It's the charge that matters, and the finding of either innocence or guilt.

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Okay.

You mentioned in your comments that it's important that this be triggered not by a political decision of Parliament, but by a finding of a court of law. I just want to clarify that what you mean is that a court in a criminal trial will have found the person guilty, and they will have convicted, but you're not talking about a separate court-of-law process. That is the trigger.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Yes.

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Currently disqualification, the termination of a senator, once they have been convicted of a crime, is actually in the Constitution, so the idea of following from that disqualification to, let's call it, the added punishment of withdrawal of a pension, there's a seamless thread there.

With respect to MPs, can you help me a little bit more in knowing what the seamless thread is? I'm not saying there's a principal distinction between senators and MPs, but as a matter of law, do we already have this or is this actually adding it?

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

That's a good question. The process is more nuanced when it comes to members of Parliament. For senators, as you said, there's a step-by-step process for ejection. For members of the House of Commons, it's at the discretion of the House, but it is much less.... It's not as defined.

My view with respect to this bill is.... I guess you could say I've put aside the expulsion. That's irrelevant for this bill because if it passes, you would lose your pension, except for, of course, what you contributed plus interest. You would lose your pension just by being found guilty of one of these crimes. Expulsion doesn't matter. You don't need to be removed from the House of Commons.

Does that answer your question?

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Yes. It makes it clear that at least the two are going to be covered even though there's more of a platform already for senators.

I understand a key element here is you're making sure somebody can't sidestep this by quitting. If the crime has been committed while you're in office and the conviction occurs later, the fact that you have resigned in between doesn't matter.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Precisely.

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

This is the last question I have, but my colleague might want to follow up on it in the second round.

In many ways, I think what you have come to us with alleviates some serious concerns we had, but now the other concern is the effect on third parties, mainly family members.

Obviously, when we talk about pensions, people immediately think of spouses, but there can also be other family members, such as children. We all believe, I guess, that children should make their own way in life and not rely on parental pensions, but there may be some children, say with disabilities, children who for good reasons are taken care of by the parents and for whom a pension would matter.

I'm wondering if we could talk some more, and maybe not only in my session, about what safeguards you have in mind for making sure that the purely innocent are not affected by this, or at least if they are affected, that we have done it with open eyes.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

That is a question I have heard. I've thought about it, and I'll answer it like this.

In my riding, if someone abuses the EI system, they don't get their EI, even though they might have family at home. If someone is convicted in a court of law of a crime, and that person is the breadwinner and they go to jail, the family is in trouble. We haven't made special allowances for that. In the same vein, I believe that in this case the measures should apply. If someone commits a crime against taxpayers and is found guilty in a court of law, the pension should be revoked.

Here's my safeguard. We have made some significant changes to the pension allowances for members of Parliament. We're contributing more now than we were when we were elected in 2011, and after the next election it's going to go up even higher. We'll be contributing about $38,000 a year. I'll just pull a number; in 10 years that's $380,000 plus the interest that has accrued. That will go back to the member should the member be found guilty. That's still a sizeable amount when you compare it to other members of the Canadian public who themselves through bad decisions and bad choices could also face hard times.

I think as a body we need to put ourselves on the same level as every other Canadian out there, and while I don't believe we need a special mechanism to assist other family members, I do believe that by reimbursing pension contributions we're talking a significant amount of money.

I suppose that's my remedy to that question, and highlights that I have given it some thought. However, I do think we can't put ourselves in a class that's different when on other matters we expect Canadians to take responsibility for their actions when they are judged to be poor ones.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you.

Mr. Lamoureux, seven minutes.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chair, I'd like to continue on that particular point, and perhaps add a different twist to get a better understanding.

Let's say that you were a member of Parliament for 15 or 20 years and in your last couple of years maybe you made some relatively stupid decisions which ultimately led to some sort of a conviction. What you're proposing would wipe it out entirely even if it was in the last couple of years one served as a member of Parliament.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

No, that's not true. I'm not proposing to wipe it out. Again, what is in the current law is that if members are expelled, they lose the taxpayer matching amount. They don't lose what they contributed. That is returned to them, as well as any interest that was earned on it. For example, if someone served for 15 or 20 years, according to the pension plan we're operating under, that could conceivably be $1 million. We will contribute about $38,000 a year, and over 10 years that's $380,000. If you multiply that again, you're getting close to $1 million once you factor in the interest.

These are numbers off the back of an envelope, but I want to be very clear that we're not taking away everything. We're returning what the member contributed, plus interest.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

If I pick up on the idea of a spouse, quite often, as you will know yourself, John, spouses get quite engaged in the whole process. Pensions are often tied into divorce proceedings. If a member of Parliament who has been around for many years goes through a divorce after a decade, there is a certain entitlement that would be assigned to that spouse in a court proceeding. All that would be for naught if in fact there was a conviction four or five years later.

Am I drawing the right conclusion on that?

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Yes, except for one small point. I would say that the individual would still have rights to the amount that was returned to the member who was found guilty.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

But for that period of time in which there were no real problems, no issues, and the MP was on the straight road and all that kind of stuff through those 15 years, and the divorce, that spouse will be—

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Yes, and I've heard these arguments, as has my spouse. Her response was, “Well, don't break the law.” That's going to be the view of Canadians as well: don't break the law.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Yes, even after divorce court, don't break the law.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Don't break the law, so....

In our constituency offices we all hear tough cases where individuals go through divorce proceedings where one person's circumstances have changed and the courts still expect payment and they go after those funds. I'm not saying that these are easy decisions and that it doesn't cause difficulty for that individual when the court decides the individual still owes so much money, for example, because of a divorce proceeding. But, again, I don't think we should put ourselves in a situation that is all that different from what other Canadians have to face day in and day out.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Okay.

I'll pose this question in an innocent fashion. There is a lot of controversy around a number of senators today; I think there are four or five. Do you feel that this legislation could affect any of those senators?

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

I do. That's why in the bill I tabled on June 3, 2013, there is a provision that, regardless of when it passes, it will apply to any convictions after that date on a go-forward basis.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

After the date it passes?

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

No. Any charges laid after June 3, 2013, will be covered by this bill. That is very similar to what they did in Nova Scotia. It was made retroactive to the day it was tabled, not from the day it was passed through the legislature.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Have you had any feedback from the other house in regard to the legislation? Are they supportive, or can you give any sort of indication?

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

No, just what I've done through researching their web page, and of course, reading the news reports of that one individual, one independent MLA, who was found guilty and lost his pension. Again, this law was passed in Nova Scotia in 2013. This is for crimes that he committed in 2008 and 2009. There's a real-world example of where this law has already been put into place and resulted in one MLA in Nova Scotia losing his parliamentary pension.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Finally, can you provide some sort of commentary, your thoughts, with respect to other people who are in trust, whether it's our police forces, civil servants, especially the upper-end civil servants? They all have public pensions that are given to them. What are your thoughts in regard to that particular issue?