moved that Bill C-201, an act respecting the protection of employees in the public service who make allegations in good faith respecting wrongdoing in the public service, be read the second time and referred to a committee.
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today on behalf of the constituents of Surrey Central and many whistleblowers to speak to my private member's bill, Bill C-201, the whistle blower human rights act, which I call in short, WHRA. I thank the hon. member for Elk Island for seconding this most important bill.
The purpose of Bill C-201 is to protect members of the Public Service of Canada from retaliation for making, in good faith, reasonably well-founded allegations of wrongdoing in the public service to a supervisor or to a public body.
Thousands of Canadians, both in the private and public sector, witness wrongdoing on the job. Most remain silent but a few cannot keep quiet. Their sense of duty and love for their country results in their choosing to speak out by blowing the whistle.
Whistleblowers are sometimes regarded as heroes, particularly when exposing serious dangers to public health or safety. At other times, they are perceived as disloyal employees or vilified as traitors.
Employees who expose workplace wrongdoing almost always pay a heavy price for their decision. They sometimes face different forms of retaliation. Punishments range from being shunned by their colleagues to harassment to termination to being blacklisting.
Feature films like The Insider , which depicts Jeffrey Wigand, a tobacco company researcher who exposed his employer on 60 Minutes , for lying about the dangers of smoking and whose life was shattered as a result, acts as a deterrent to potential whistleblowers.
Let us take a moment to remember some of the well publicized cases in Canada.
Bernard Dussault, chief actuary, Canada pension plan, reported that he was asked to modify numbers to paint a more positive state of the CPP. He was fired.
Michelle Brill-Edwards, senior physician in Health Canada's prescription drug approval process, was pressured to approve medication that had caused deaths in the United States. She went public and had to resign from her job.
Joanna Gualtieri, portfolio manager for Latin America and Caribbean in DFAIT, blew the whistle on waste and lavish spending on diplomatic housing and embassies. The Inspector General and Auditor General of Canada later supported her allegations. She was harassed and marginalized within the department. Finally, she had to quit, go through the expensive courts and her career was ruined.
Brian McAdam was a 25 year veteran foreign service officer in Canadian diplomatic missions in the Caribbean, Europe, the Middle East, South America and Asia. In 1991 he documented evidence of corruption at Canada's foreign mission in Hong Kong. I talked about that in some of my previous speeches. He was demeaned and ostracized by his colleagues and finally he gave up. He took an early retirement.
Michael Sanders, financial analyst, Office of the Superintendent for Financial Institutions, blew the whistle on the absence of sufficient safeguards to protect taxpayers against the collapse of major financial institutions. He was fired from his job.
Dr. Shiv Chopra, a senior veterinary drug evaluator in Health Canada's Therapeutic Products and Food Branch, blew the whistle on the drug approval process for bovine growth hormones. He said human health concerns were being ignored due to pressure from lobbyists of drug companies. He suffered harassment.
Corporal Robert Reid, a veteran RCMP officer associated with the report called “Sidewinder”, which has been ignored due to political pressure, paid a huge price like others.
There are many other cases: Dr. Margaret Haydon, Health Canada; Marilla Lo, Treasury Board; Russell Mills, the Ottawa Citizen ; Bob Stenhouse, RCMP; and Dr. Barry Armstrong, Canadian Armed Forces. The list goes on but since my time is limited, I will stop naming them.
If public servants reveal wrongdoings within their departments or agencies, should they suffer as consequence or should they be rewarded? I believe employees should be able to raise their concerns without fear of reprisal. This is why I introduced my bill, Bill C-201, which would make it an offence to discipline or disadvantage an employee for such actions and provides for a fine and order of restitution to the employee.
The Liberal cabinet members, while in opposition, are on the record supporting whistleblower protection. For instance, the former Liberal Party critic for public sector ethics and current government House leader, the hon. member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, said in 1992:
The [whistleblowers] bill provides protection for people who are trying to act in the best public interest...It provides for means to protect people who are employees of the public sector and feel morally bound to protect the interests of the public.
He went on to say:
Why should someone who is defending the public interest in good conscience have to then defend themselves in courts and everywhere else for having taken what was right to start with? That is the difficulty with the absence of any kind of law that protects whistleblowers.
He also said:
I think as a general principle all of us who represent the public interests in this House should believe in our conscience that it is not the side of the boss you take, it is the side of the public because it sent us here. That is the fundamental principle of our democratic system.
He went on to say:
In order to provide that kind of accountability and those means, we need a bill such as this...I think in principle, I like it.
The hon. member then went on to quote from a Liberal caucus approved document. The document was entitled “Public Sector Ethics” and it called for whistleblower protection. I do not agree with the government House leader very often but on this issue I absolutely agree with him.
Since the direct quotation establishes that the Liberals, their caucus and the former Liberals ethics critic agreed in principle with the whistleblower protection legislation, the million dollar question is: after 10 years, where is the whistleblower protection legislation?
Since 1993, there have been no government bills on this subject. Maybe it did not get a chance to draft it but now we have one, which is Bill C-201.
Sound legislation protects democracy from itself. The presence of a dictatorship coincides with the lack of sound legislation and the habitual rejection of transparency and accountability. The habitual rejection of transparency and accountability in public life systematically corrupts social institutions. Corrupt social institutions breed neglect, political interference, waste, mismanagement, corruption and weaken our national security.
Whistleblowers are now being muzzled and denied a forum. The Public Service Commission has no power to hear the cases of whistleblowers. The Public Service Staff Relations Board has no jurisdiction for a whistleblowing claim. Ministers do not even respond to letters from whistleblowers. A good starting point is the creation of and passage of legislation that is directed at institutions that are publicly funded.
Some people might come up with a lame excuse and say that we have an internal disclosure policy. The Public Service Integrity Office was established by the terms of this Treasury Board policy to be an agency to facilitate the internal disclosure by public servants of wrongdoing in the public service. It is considered to be independent, external and impartial to receive and investigate good faith disclosure allegations alleging wrongdoing.
Let us look at the contrast between the whistleblowers human rights act, the WHRA, and the internal disclosure policy, IDP.
First, according to the WHRA, every employee has a duty to disclose wrongdoing. Under IDP, employees have no obligation to reveal wrongdoing, though the integrity officer has criticized the IDP for this failure.
The WHRA would permit public servants to disclose alleged wrongdoing to public bodies, including the media. On the other hand, under IDP unauthorized external disclosures can result in disciplinary action, including termination of employment.
Under the WHRA, a whistleblower would have the right to bring a civil action before a court. Under IDP, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal is an option for employees facing harassment.
According to the WHRA, a supervisor, a manager or other person of authority who harasses a whistleblower would be subject to criminal prosecution and would face a fine of up to $5,000. As well, they would be subject to personal liability for any resulting damages that may be awarded to an employee pursuant to any civil or administrative proceeding.
According to the IDP, employees are subject to disciplinary actions, including termination of employment. Superiors are not liable or responsible.
According to the WHRA, the minister responsible for the relevant department shall issue a public apology to an employee who is successful in a claim. Under IDP, there is nothing of this nature.
According to the WHRA, an employee who successfully blew the whistle would also be recognized with an ex gratis award. Under IDP, there are no rewards, but only punishment for whistleblowers.
The integrity officer wants some sort of reward system introduced to offer encouragement to public servants to come forward in good faith with evidence of wrongdoing.
According to the WHRA, written allegations shall be investigated and reported upon within 30 days of receipt. In the IDP there is no time guarantees even in feeble attempts.
With WHRA, the minister shall ensure that remedial action is taken promptly. IDP promises a prompt response and failure to do so will result in the integrity officer taking his report to the Clerk of the Privy Council.
According to the WHRA, the President of the Treasury Board shall create a registry in which a copy of every written allegation is deposited. This registry would be made available to the public. In the IDP the integrity officer issues an annual report to Parliament.
Dr. Edward Keyserlingk, Canada's integrity officer, began his work in April 2002. He is critical of the government's current whistleblowing policy, not legislation, and he argues that Canada needs a tougher whistleblowing policy. It should be a public servant's duty to expose any suspected wrongdoing, and not enough people are coming forward.
He says that whistleblowers should be rewarded with promotions and citations. He says that the creation of his seven person office is not good enough to stop the inertia, suspicion and fear of job reprisals so ingrained in the system.
By May 2002, the integrity officer had received 45 cases and 21 were quickly closed. Either the issue was resolved, or the matter was referred to another jurisdiction, or a decision was made not to pursue or it did not come within the purview of his office.
Dr. Keyserlingk identifies that the root problem is a lack of leadership and accountability. I translate that lack of leadership into lack of political will. Critics say that we will have a framework that offers no protection to public servants because the minister's office said so.
In many countries around the world public service employees are protected by whistleblowing legislation. The United Kingdom passed the public interest disclosure act in 1999. The U.S. federal employees were initially protected under the civil service reforms act, 1978, which empowered a special council of the merit system protection board and it was unanimously passed. In Canada we do not have such legislation.
Therefore I would ask all hon. members to kindly support Bill C-201 and let us send it to the committee where any appropriate changes or amendments can be made.