Thank you.
With regard to recommendation 4 by the Ethics Commissioner on restricting sponsored travel, the Ethics Commissioner, at the end of his section, says that this would still allow an MP to be sponsored to travel to speak at a conference. That's a huge loophole. All of the lobby groups that are now giving MPs junket trips overseas—and their families and associates sometimes—which is all legal under the huge section 15 loophole, which never should have been in the code and is essentially a form of legalized bribery.... All it would mean is that those trips would turn into speaking events for MPs.
Section 15 should have been removed years ago. It should be removed now. It's a form of legalized bribery. The sponsored travel loophole, among many other loopholes, needs to be closed.
I will be making the written submission in the next couple of days that will give you all the details of the dozen or so key changes that Democracy Watch and the Government Ethics Coalition are recommending to turn the code into an actual conflict of interest code for members of the House of Commons, instead of what it is now, which is that it is almost impossible to be in a conflict of interest; it allows MPs and their staff to accept all sorts of unethical gifts and favours and essentially practice favour trading.