Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
In my time at the House as law clerk, I worked with and for the Board of Internal Economy. I saw it in its good times and in its bad times.
I'm pleased to see the House take on this review of how its internal financial and administrative affairs are managed. In the course of its study, I would hope the committee would keep in mind two important considerations about the House of Commons. First, the House is where our democracy plays itself out between elections. Partisan politics is an inherent feature of the House and must be accommodated in any administrative restructuring. Second, administrative independence is essential to the constitutional function of the House and to its political credibility as a parliamentary institution.
I expect what drove the House to launch this review is the recognition that Canadians generally are increasingly concerned about the spending practices of parliamentarians and want to see more transparency and accountability in the management of the internal financial and administrative affairs of both the House of Commons and the Senate.
In my time at the House I found the board generally acted responsibly in its management of the financial and administrative business of the House. I attribute this to the fact that the House, as an elected body, is hard-wired, as it were, for serving the public interest and for accountability, though partisan interests or collective self-interest sometimes seem to influence the business outcome.
From time to time, it seemed to me that a party's political agenda, some current political conflict, or the government's political agenda were allowed to interfere with the business of the board, and that caused matters to be unnecessarily delayed or left unresolved for protracted periods of time or simply not addressed. To some extent, this is understandable and unavoidable, but it should not be allowed to cause the board to become dysfunctional and the internal affairs of the House, as an institution, poorly managed.
In my view, the public interest of greater transparency and the House's interest in more efficiency in its internal governance will be better served by establishing a more arm's-length relationship between the House and the board, but not by establishing an outside body as the governing administrative authority for the House. To this end, I would make the following suggestions, which in the interests of time I can only itemize here in point form; there are six of them: one, that the name of the board be changed to reflect its function in contemporary language—this is an obvious one; two, that the composition of the board not reflect party standings in the House but that the recognized parties in the House be represented equally on the board; three, that ministers and other House leaders, other than whips, not sit on the board, and that appointments to the board by made by each caucus; four, that board meetings be held in public, with its agendas made public the day before, subject to the usual limitations for privacy, but that the board establish two permanent subcommittees on financial and administrative matters respectively that would meet in private but present their reports publicly to the board for consideration and approval; five, that the board table its minutes in the House no later than the first sitting day immediately following the next board meeting; and finally, six, that at the end of each Parliament, other than those of less than a year, the Auditor General audit, or in some manner review, the financial decisions of the board and the spending of House leaders, members of Parliament, and each caucus, with enforcement measures in place to recover any funds found to have been wrongly spent.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.