House of Commons Hansard #239 of the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was finance.

Topics

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4 p.m.

Some hon. members

Yea.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

All those opposed will please say nay.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4 p.m.

Some hon. members

Nay.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Vote #402

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4:40 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

I declare the motion carried.

When shall the bill be read a third time? By leave, now?

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4:40 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Private Members' Business--Secret Ballot VotesPoints of OrderGovernment Orders

4:40 p.m.

NDP

Peter Julian NDP New Westminster—Burnaby, BC

Mr. Speaker, I am rising today concerning the practice that you will follow in the upcoming votes to determine the votability of Bill C-362, the important bill from the very dedicated and hard-working member of Parliament from Nanaimo—Ladysmith.

This is a very important and historic point in time. We have never used Standing Order 92(4)(a) and (b) before, and therefore the process that you use, Mr. Speaker, will determine the precedence for this in the future and for future parliaments. You may be tempted to follow the practice following upon the election of the Speaker, the only other time under our rules when we have this secret ballot vote. This practice has the clerk with the assistance of table officers conduct the count and, in the morning after the vote has been held, announce the decision of the vote with no reference to the number of ballots cast for each side of the question.

Mr. Speaker, I am asking for you to consider releasing the numeric results of the ballot and the names of the members of Parliament who have voted.

I understand the rationale for you, Mr. Speaker, not to release either result. This place runs on precedent and previous practice and the only other use of a secret ballot vote in the House is for the election of the Speaker. That procedure is prescribed by Standing Orders 2 through 7 and they are designed to show the importance of the following of these rules. They clearly say that for electing the Speaker, the only folks who shall handle the count will be those from the table. Our rules are also clear that there will be no release of the numeric ballot results, only the names of the candidates still on the ballot and the naming of the winner. Mr. Speaker, you know this very well as you went through the process.

I submit to you today, Mr. Speaker, that the procedure for the conduct of the secret ballot vote to determine if Bill C-352 will be allowed a vote is not analogous to the process of electing a Speaker. I submit to you that it is not appropriate to apply a procedure for the election of a Speaker to a question being put before the House as a normal part of the legislative process.

First, these two secret ballot votes are doing very different things. Electing a Speaker is a constitutional obligation of the House of Commons. Sections 44 through 49 of the Constitution Act, 1867, the core part of our Constitution, strictly deal with the election of the Speaker and the powers vested to the Speaker therein. The election process was designed back in the 1980s for the Speaker's election. Parliamentarians at that time had an objective of allowing the free and fair election of the Speaker and the rules were designed to make sure that the newly elected Speaker had the legitimacy and freedom to perform her or his important constitutional role in the strongest way possible. Parliamentarians made sure that our most trusted officials would be those conducting the election to make it above reproach. To make sure that the Speaker has the maximum confidence of the chamber that elects her or him, the number of the ballots would not be released so the Speaker's mandate would never be questioned.

I believe that the subject of Bill C-352 is of critical importance, especially to the coastal communities it would so strongly impact, but I have no illusion that if the bill is votable is on the same procedural or constitutional level as the election of a Speaker. When the rules for votability of private members' bills were being developed, which took place 15 to 20 years after the election of our first Speaker by secret ballot, it was not envisioned that the importance of that decision was on the same level as choosing the chief presiding officer over the elected assembly of our country. The decision before members of this Parliament in the next few days will be about a specific initiative of a private member being able to have a vote in the House. It is not a constitutional question, but rather part of the legislative process for private members' business.

As you know, Mr. Speaker, we have lots of PMB votes in this House. We know the questions and we get to know the results when the vote takes place and so do Canadians. We get to know how many members voted on each side of the question and we generally value the numeric value of the vote as a transparent way where Canadians can see their democracy at work, and that helps instill confidence in our system of government. I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that it is antithetical for this place not to know what the numbers were on any side of any question, which is part of the legislative process. Our democracy is not simply about having representatives make decisions; it is about making decisions in a way that builds confidence in the people who sent us here to make decisions on their behalf, and we do that by being open and transparent.

At each stage of a bill, we vote openly and publicly so that our constituents know how their representative voted. That is also why the final result of the vote is communicated immediately, as the Speaker just did, so that everyone can see how much support there is for a given issue.

The purpose of the secret ballot under Standing Order 92(4)(b) is to allow members to vote freely without their party whip knowing how they voted. This different way of voting stemmed from a desire to give members greater freedom to express themselves on private members' business and was part of a push for a clearer distinction between government business and private members' business during the reforms of 2002 and 2003. Those changes were designed to achieve a clear distinction in terms of both procedure and content.

Other aspects of this reform included the creation of the private members' draw, the exclusion of ministers and parliamentary secretaries from the process, the different voting method for members of the House, and the establishment of a separate order of precedence from government business. It was in that spirit that Standing Order 92(4)(b) was created.

Page 32 of House of Commons Procedure and Practice, Second Edition, states that “Responsible government has long been considered an essential element of government based on the Westminster model.” It goes on to say that “responsible government means that a government must be responsive to its citizens, that it must operate responsibly (that is, be well organized in developing and implementing policy) and that its Ministers must be accountable or responsible to Parliament.” For there to be confidence in responsible government, I submit that being open and transparent is essential.

Because the appeal process that we are undertaking this week by secret ballot, starting tomorrow, has never happened in this place before, it is totally appropriate for you to decide how the result of this vote should be released, not based on the practice used for the election of the speaker, for the reasons I have just set out, but based as much as practical on the rules we use in the legislative process, those of clarity and transparency. It is up to you, Mr. Speaker, that the spirit of the drafters of this Standing Order be heard. I therefore ask that, like all other parts of the legislative process, the numerical results of the decision on the votability of Bill C-352 be made public.

Private Members' Business--Secret Ballot VotesPoints of OrderGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan

I thank the hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby for raising his point of order. I will have more to say on the subject tomorrow morning. However, at first blush, if I understood him correctly, I think that the member is asking me not to follow precedent in relation to the closest thing we have had to this kind of a vote previously. It also seems to me that he is asking me to do something that the Standing Order does not, and that the House has not authorized the Speaker to do. Also, it strikes me that this might be a topic that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs might wish to look at. Nonetheless, I will be coming back tomorrow morning with more to say on this subject.

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Drummond,Government Appointments; the hon. member Nanaimo—Ladysmith, Status of Women; the hon. member for Mégantic—L'Érable, Rail Transportation.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

Kings—Hants Nova Scotia

Liberal

Scott Brison LiberalPresident of the Treasury Board

moved that Bill C-58, An Act to amend the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, be read the third time and passed.

Mr. Speaker, I am thankful for this opportunity to speak on Bill C-58, which would amend Canada's Access to Information Act.

As we developed these reforms, we were guided by the principle that government information belongs to the people it serves.

We remain committed to that principle, which was introduced for the first time in the Access to Information Act in 1983.

Now 34 years later, our proposed reforms would advance the original intent of the act in a way that reflects Canada's technologies, policies, and legislation. This is not a one-off exercise. Rather, we have kicked off a progressive ongoing renewal of the ATI system, one that will protect Canadians' rights of access to government information well into the future. Our efforts began over a year ago.

In May 2016, I issued a directive suggesting openness by default in government.

Open by default means having a culture across government in which data and information are increasingly released as a matter of course, unless there are specific reasons not to do so. Now, with the amendments proposed in Bill C-58, we are taking the next step. These amendments would create a new part of the act relating to proactive disclosure, one that effectively puts into practice the idea of open by default. Proactive disclosure would apply to more than 240 departments, agencies, and crown corporations, including the Prime Minister's Office, ministers' offices, senators and members of Parliament, institutions that support Parliament, administrative institutions that support the courts, and over 1,100 judges of the superior courts.

We also added to the legislation the proactive publication of information that we know is of interest to Canadians and that provides greater transparency and accountability with respect to the use of public money.

This will include travel and hospitality expenses for ministers and their staffs and senior officials across government, contracts over $10,000, and all contracts for MPs and senators, grants and contributions over $25,000, mandate letters and revised mandate letters of ministers, briefing packages for new ministers and deputy ministers, lists of briefing notes for the minister and deputy minister, and briefing binders prepared for question period and parliamentary committee appearances.

Of course, this does not absolve us of our responsibility to strengthen the request-based system. We know that the access to information system has been the subject widespread and warranted criticism. In fact, demands on the system have grown massively in recent years. That is why we are developing a guide to provide requesters with clear explanations of exemptions and exclusions, investing in tools to make processing information requests more efficient, allowing federal institutions with the same minister to share request processing services for greater efficiency, and increasing government training to get common and consistent interpretation of the application of ATI rules.

In addition, the proposed bill gives the Information Commissioner new powers, including the power to order the release of government records. This is an important advancement that was first recommended by a parliamentary committee studying the Access to Information Act back in 1987. Our government is acting on it and Bill C-58 would change the commissioner's role from an ombudsperson to an authority with the power to order the release of government records.

We are taking steps to help government institutions eliminate requests made in bad faith, which are detrimental to the system.

By tying up government resources, such vexatious, bad faith requests can interfere with an institution's ability to do its work and respond to other requests. Let me be clear. We have heard the concerns expressed about how we must safeguard against the abuse of this proposed measure. A large or broad request, or one that causes government discomfort, does not, of itself, represent bad faith on the part of the requester.

I would like to address the amendments made at committee. Our government believes in working with parliamentarians through the committee system for the good of all Canadians. I was happy to see that the committee passed over a dozen amendments, which serve to further strengthen and clarify our government's intent to strengthen and reform our access to information regime.

For example, one amendment removes the ability of departments to decline to act on a request simply because the request does not specify the subject matter, type of record, or time period. It gives the Office of the Information Commissioner the power to approve or reject upfront a department's request to decline to act on a request. It clarifies that a department can only decline to act based on the record already being available if it is the identical record.

These amendments address concerns raised by both the Information Commissioner and other stakeholders, including representatives of indigenous claims organizations. The amendments further underline the fact that we want to ensure that the system cannot be abused and cannot be used to decline to act on legitimate requests.

The committee also passed an amendment giving the Information Commissioner the power to publish the results of her investigations and to publish their orders. This is an important strengthening of the commissioner's powers.

The committee passed an amendment that imposes a 30-day deadline for the proactive disclosure of mandate letters.

This is just the first phase of our access to information modernization. In fact, Bill C-58 includes a mandatory review of the act every five years. The first review will begin no later than one year after this bill receives royal assent. What is more, it will require that departments regularly review the information being requested under the act. This will help us understand and increase information that could be proactively disclosed.

After 34 years, Canada's Access to Information Act needs updating. This is going to be an ongoing work in progress as we have an evergreening, modernization and strengthening of the Access to Information Act. We look forward to continuing our work to help make government more open, transparent, and accountable.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Conservative

John Brassard Conservative Barrie—Innisfil, ON

Mr. Speaker, if the minister would like to start with openness, accountability, and transparency, maybe he should start with the minister who sits beside him, the finance minister. We saw a display today in the House of Commons where no questions were answered by that minister. How does that give Canadians any confidence in this minister's ability to push through legislation that speaks about openness, accountability, and transparency?

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Liberal

Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS

Mr. Speaker, first, the Conservative government we replaced was the first government in the history of the British Commonwealth to be found in contemp of Parliament for not providing information to Parliament on the costs of its legislation. In fact, in 2006, the Conservatives' platform stated they were going to modernize the Access to Information Act, and 10 years later they had not even touched it. We are actually getting the job done. We are doing it, and we would welcome the member's support.

With respect to our finance minister, the absurd smears by opposition members today implying that our finance minister somehow entered politics to make money are totally asinine. Our finance minister entered politics to make a difference. He is making a difference, because two years in he cut the taxes of the middle class and brought in a Canada child benefit that has helped lift over 300,000 Canadian kids out of poverty. We have—

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

Order, please. The hon. member for Timmins—James Bay is rising on a point of order.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

NDP

Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON

Mr. Speaker, I find it appalling that the minister is completely avoiding the issue. We have a bill and he is throwing out all manner of political stuff and attacking the Conservatives. He should stick to and explain his own attack on the access to information system. I would like the Speaker to make sure that the minister is held accountable to at least explain why he is attacking the access to information system.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

I see the hon. President of the Treasury Board rising. I thank the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay for his intervention. I think we are into a dispute about the facts in this case. I recognize that we have just begun the debate on this question and there will be more opportunities for questions and comments.

Does the hon. President of the Treasury Board wish to address the point of order?

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Liberal

Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS

Certainly, Mr. Speaker, because as is often the case, the member misses the point, and he missed the question. The question was about the finance minister. I was speaking to that question—

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

Order. We are going to go back to the President of the Treasury Board to let him finish his response to the hon. member for Barrie—Innisfil, and then we will carry on with questions and comments.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5 p.m.

Liberal

Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS

Mr. Speaker, again, I was answering the question posed by my colleague from Barrie—Innisfil, which referred to the finance minister. I was speaking of the finance minister, who entered politics to make a difference. He is indeed making a difference, with the best economic growth we have had in over a decade, at 3.7%, something that the previous government did not accomplish. I am proud of the role that the finance minister is playing in terms of the kinds of policy that creates good middle-class growth for all Canadians.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

NDP

Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the President of the Treasury Board, but I cannot, because I do not know what bill he is talking about. Bill C-58 would do the opposite of what he just said it would do.

Here is what the Liberals promised would be in this legislation. They promised that access to information would apply to his office and to the Prime Minister's Office. It does not. They promised that the bill would apply appropriately to administrative institutions that support Parliament and the courts. It does not. The government promised that the bill would empower the Information Commissioner to order the release of government information. It does not.

That is not just my opinion, it is the opinion of the Information Commissioner who appeared before us at committee and moved recommendations to fix Bill C-58. It is somewhat offensive to hear the Treasury Board President talking about respecting the work of committee, because the Liberals struck down amendment after amendment. These were amendments that were based on the testimony we heard at committee, from not only the Information Commissioner, but representatives from first nations communities and the media.

The Liberals promised a number of things, one of which was to rely on evidence. On all of these measures that I just outlined, Bill C-58 is “regressive”, and that is also according to the Information Commissioner.

Who does the member expect us to trust, a government that will not answer simple and direct questions day after day, or the Information Commissioner who is the watchdog and works on behalf of Parliament and all Canadians to make sure we get the information we need to hold government to account?

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

Liberal

Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS

Mr. Speaker, first of all, we are the first government in 34 years to act to modernize the Access to Information Act. In fact, we have given the Information Commissioner, for the first time ever, real order-making power. She can tell a department or agency to respond to a requester, and the department or agency, after that order is issued, has to respond within 30 days. Failure to do so will be in violation of the law. The department or agency can challenge her, but that would be in a court of law, and that will be decided by a judge. That is real order-making power, and that is progress.

In terms of the application to ministers' offices and the PMO, we are doing that through proactive disclosure. I know why the NDP do not like proactive disclosure. Those members did not like it in 2013, when our Prime Minister, in opposition as leader of the Liberal Party, led the way to proactively disclosing expenses of MPs. We were the first to do that. The Conservatives were quite supportive of that. The NDP did not support proactive disclosure of those expenses, and that party put up all kinds of reasons as to why that should not be done.

We are glad that we led in opposition on proactive disclosure. We are glad that, in government, we are leading in terms of proactive disclosure as an essential part of modernizing Canada's Access to Information Act.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

Vancouver Quadra B.C.

Liberal

Joyce Murray LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board

Mr. Speaker, I am proud of the work that the minister has been doing with respect to modernizing the access to information regime for the first time in many years, and for his promise to continue doing that work.

I would like to touch on the note that the minister made that there were over a dozen amendments made to this legislation. He mentioned that those amendments reflect the things the Information Commissioner was asking for, some of which were our intent in the first place, but were not perfectly expressed in the original bill. Other amendments were to move further based on the commissioner's request.

Could the minister tell us how this compares with the previous Conservative government with respect to listening to and consulting with people, and then being willing to have amendments made by committee?

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:05 p.m.

Liberal

Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, the member for Vancouver Quadra, who has been doing a great job as parliamentary secretary on this and other files.

These amendments address concerns raised by the Information Commissioner and other stakeholders, including representatives of indigenous claims organizations. We have taken these concerns seriously and are open to moving forward with them. We want to make sure that the system cannot be abused and that a request cannot be declined when it is a legitimate request.

The call for a vexatious clause in this has come from the ethics committee in the past. In fact, the Information Commissioner has called for it in the past. It is important that it be properly and narrowly defined. There are eight provinces and the three territories that have a similar clause.

I also agree with the amendment that would provide the power of the Information Commissioner, up front in the process, to either agree with or reject the use of a vexatious clause in the denial of a request. I support that, and I believe it should be up front. That is why the parliamentary process informs and strengthens legislation. It is why I demonstrated very early that I was open to amendments that would help to strengthen the legislation.

Beyond that, within a year of the passage of Bill C-58, we would have a mandatory full review to assess these changes and inform future changes. This is a work in progress—

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:10 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Barrie—Innisfil.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:10 p.m.

Conservative

John Brassard Conservative Barrie—Innisfil, ON

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the minister speak, and as I sit in the House on a daily basis, as we all do, is it any wonder that we find it hard to believe that anything the government says it is going to do will actually come to fruition? We have seen broken promise after broken promise. If members do not believe me, just look at what some of those who are looking closely at Bill C-58 are saying. By ruling out the possibility to obtain information from ministers' offices and the Prime Minister's Office, the government is breaking its campaign promise to establish a government open by default. Moreover, the possibility to refuse certain access to information requests on an undefined basis jeopardizes the transparency and the openness of this government. That was from Katie Gibbs, the executive director of Evidence for Democracy group. However, there are more, and I will refer to more as I get through my speech today on Bill C-58.

I would be remiss if I did not go back a couple of hours, back to the future, and the egregious display of contempt for parliamentary democracy. It has been a practice in this place for many years that when opposition members ask questions directly and pointedly to the finance minister, as we did today, or to other ministers of the crown, that those answers are expected. They are expected on behalf of all Canadians. This is why we are elected to come to this place; it is to ask the type of hard questions that were asked today.

In the preamble to the movement of a motion to adjourn debate on Bill C-63, I will remind the House that we are talking about openness and transparency, which is something the government runs around saying. The Prime Minister stands up in front of microphones, posts on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat that the government is more open and transparent than any other government in the history of Canada. I would suggest that nothing could be further from the truth.

I would again remind the House of what I said before I moved the motion to adjourn debate. I said to the Speaker that before I resumed my comments, I wanted to go back to question period and what I thought, quite frankly, was an egregious display of contempt for our parliamentary democracy. This minister was asked multiple times whether he had sold his shares in Morneau Shepell in advance of his tax reform announcement, and he failed to answer the question on multiple occasions.

Therefore, in the absence of the minister answering those questions on a bill that, quite frankly, he has influence over, I would call into question the ability of Canadians to have confidence in him conducting further business on the bill. It is confidence, and not just on this bill, but any bill. The Minister of Finance was asked a minimum of 14 times today in question period whether in fact he had sold his shares in Morneau Shepell in advance of his tax reform policies being announced, and each time he skirted the question. He would not answer. He went on about the middle class and those working hard to join it. Well, right now, it is a matter of the middle class and those working hard to stay in it because of the policies of the finance minister.

We are expected to sit in the House and accept not just what the President of Treasury Board talks about in terms of openness and accountability, but there are multiple people, stakeholders, who have a vested interest in what the President of Treasury Board is promoting and proposing in terms of this access to information legislation, and they are being critical of it. They are being as critical as we are being on the finance minister, because he needs to answer the questions.

The government needs to force the finance minister to answer the questions as to whether in fact he had any vested interest or knowledge of the sale of those shares. It speaks to credibility, to transparency, to accountability, which the government is good at talking about, but when it comes to implementing or living by that, it does not.

What was funny about Bill C-63 and the motion we put forward was that every single person, save one, I believe the member from the Green Party, voted in support of adjourning the debate on that bill. They did that because they do not want to talk about it.

All we are asking is that the minister answer the questions that have been asked of him by those who represent Canadians in this House, every single one of us who are not members of the Liberal Party.

We are actually hearing about Liberal members who are questioning their confidence in the ability of the finance minister to conduct the business of the country. Why? It is because he has failed to answer the questions. He has answered, but in generalities. He goes back to the fetal position of saying that they are working hard for the middle class and those working hard to join it. However, he refuses to answer the questions.

If we are talking about openness and transparency, and this government is proposing Bill C-58, why is the finance minister not being open and transparent with Canadians? We can speculate that perhaps he knows that Canadians will not be happy with the answers. They will not be happy with the villa in France and why he hid that from the Ethics Commissioner, that he had complete control over Morneau Shepell shares and shares in various corporations, or that perhaps he was the one who sold that $10 million worth of shares just ahead of making that announcement. Openness and transparency: what an absolute joke.

I also want to talk about some other individuals who have concerns about what the government is proposing in Bill C-58. The bill proposes a good amendment, and I will give some credit here, by requiring more proactive publication of some information by giving the Information Commissioner the power to order the publication of some information, but it does nothing to fill the huge gaps in the act, as was promised by the Liberals.

We need more changes to have a government that is transparent and open by default. Again, the Liberals talk about openness and transparency, but they do not act in that way.

"The bill is a step backwards in allowing government officials to deny requests for information if they think the request is frivolous or made in bad faith. Public officials should not be given this power, as they will likely use it as a new loophole to deny the public information it has a right know.” Dale Conacher, the co-founder of Democracy Watch, said that.

Stephane Giroux, the president of the Fédération professionnelle des journalistes du Québec said, “The most interesting fact for us was to have access to documents from ministers' offices. False alarm. It was too good to be true.”

In spite of the fact that the President of the Treasury Board is standing up and saying that all these changes have occurred within Bill C-58, the reality is that there are still significant concerns. I think there is concern among Canadians. This past weekend, I had lots of events in my riding, and one of the things I kept hearing about is confidence in the finance minister to continue to do his job, given the circumstances and the besieged state he has been in over the last while. The fact that every single member of the Liberal caucus voted to adjourn debate on this issue calls into question not just Canadians' confidence in the finance minister but the Liberal backbenches' confidence in the finance minister.

The Hill Times today reported that there are concerns among Liberal backbenchers that this is going to affect them in 2019. Do members know the reason they gave for that concern? Many of them will have been here for one term of four years. They are concerned about their pensions. That is what it said in the paper.

How about being concerned about the process of democracy in this country and making sure that no one benefits from having holdings, in the case of the finance minister, that they have not brought forward and been transparent about?

Never mind pensions, we should be focused on what the finance minister is doing by not being transparent and accountable to Canadians and question whether some of the legislation he is putting forward, such as Bill C-27, actually benefits him.

I would remind the House as well that it is not just a matter of benefiting him. What about the benefit to his family? What about his wife? What about his kids? What about his father? How many Morneau Shepell shareholders, or anyone directly or indirectly associated with that family, are benefiting as a result of the policies the finance minister is putting forward? We talk about being open and transparent, but the finance minister has been anything but, and we certainly saw that egregious display today in the House.

As parents, we teach our kids about the difference between right and wrong. We tell our kids what they cannot do and explain it to them. We tell them what they can do and explain the reasons why. We talk often to our kids about character. School systems, through the policies of education, speak about character. They speak about honesty and integrity, yet the finance minister is showing none of those character traits to Canadians with his actions.

We are dealing with a piece of legislation, Bill C-58, that, quite frankly, is difficult to support for many reasons, the least of which is the government not showing any strong movement toward openness and transparency. It is a very top-down approach by the government.

The former information commissioner, from 2007 to 2008, said, “there's no one [in government departments] to review what they choose not to disclose, and I think that goes against the principle of the statute. They've taken the commissioner out of the loop. If you ask for these briefing notes...[and parts of them had been blacked out], you had someone to appeal to.”

This is no longer the case with Bill C-58.

He went on, “We can't even go to a court. It's one step forward, two steps back.”

We have seen a lot of one step forward and two steps back with the government. My fear is that the openness and transparency the Liberals ran on are not there anymore. We have seen that the finance minister cannot even answer a simple question. He will not even answer a simple question. Quite frankly, after seeing this display we have been seeing over the course of the last several months to questions being asked, how can we have any faith? If the finance minister will not even answer a simple question, how can we expect the whole of government to be open, honest, and transparent?

I am saddened by what I see, quite frankly, as a new parliamentarian. I know the other side is going to say that there were circumstances in the past when similar issues happened. We are not talking about circumstances in the past. The Liberals were the same opposition that stood and talked about the egregiousness of the actions of previous governments. They ran to be different. They said that they were going to impose real change. We have seen nothing to suggest anything different. We are seeing a government that is more inward. We are seeing a government that is controlled from the top down. We are seeing a government where the Prime Minister's Office runs everything. Not just on this issue but on multiple issues, anything but what they said has come true.

Conservatives are not going to support Bill C-58. I certainly call into question the finance minister. I call into question his ability to manage the financial affairs of the country, given the circumstances we have seen over the course of the last several months.

Despite their campaign promises, the Liberals have failed to increase government openness and transparency with this bill. As I have said, it is no surprise. This is effectively a government that chooses to publish when it is accountable to Canadians. It is not being accountable all the time. It is going to pick and choose when it wants to be accountable to Canadians. In practice, what the Liberals have effectively done is give themselves the power to refuse to respond to access to information requests they find embarrassing. Under the principle of openness and transparency, should not everything be responded to?

I understand that there might be matters of national security that are not in the public interest, but this is something different from what they ran on, as far as openness and transparency goes. With the changes proposed by the Liberals, less information would be available to Canadians. Moreover, the Liberals would do nothing to address unacceptable delays, so we would continue to see that information punted down the field and would have unacceptable delays in when that information would be put forward to Canadians.

I spent some time talking about Bill C-58, but in the context of openness and transparency, I cannot emphasize enough the egregious nature of the issue we have been dealing for the last couple of months with the finance minister. Again today there was zero accountability, zero transparency, and zero openness. It is a pattern that has evolved with the Liberal government over the course of the last two years. It should concern all of us. It certainly concerns stakeholders who have an interest in this. However, it is not just a concern to all of us who are here to represent Canadians. It is a concern to all Canadians, because it is the small stuff that leads to the big stuff. If we cannot get simple answers to simple questions in this place of openness and transparency, how can we expect to get that information from a government that proves, day after day, that it is not interested in openness? It is not interested in transparency and accountability, in spite of the fact that it ran on that very thing.

They said they were going to be different. The reality is, and we have seen it over the course of the last two years, that nothing could be further from the truth. With the display of the finance minister over the course of the last couple of months, and certainly today, there is not much faith in the ability of the government to be open, transparent, and accountable. That is why Bill C-58 is flawed. We continue to be concerned about the actions of the finance minister and how the Liberal government and these Liberal backbenchers can continue to endorse the display we are seeing here on a daily basis.

Access to Information ActGovernment Orders

5:30 p.m.

Vancouver Quadra B.C.

Liberal

Joyce Murray LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board

Madam Speaker, I must say I am disappointed. The member clearly does not have the intention of raising the quality of debate in the House. First, he barely spoke about Bill C-58. I am proud that we are the first government in 34 years to make major reforms to the Access to Information Act. Second, he was wrong in the few comments he made about the bill. He said it would deny access to information requests that are frivolous or made in bad faith. In fact, the amendments would give the commissioner up-front approval power over any department's request to decline to act on a request because the department believed it was vexatious or in bad faith. The member clearly did not even read the committee's changes and is not up to date on the bill. That is disappointing. It is not a priority for him, clearly.

I also want to note that in its 2006 platform, the Conservative Party made a clear commitment to update the access to information law, and the Conservatives did absolutely nothing in 10 years. Did they never intend to actually deliver on that promise, or did they just not care enough to do a thing about it in 10 years?