During the House Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics Committee’s five-year legislative review in the spring on the Lobbying Act, Mr. Clement (Parry Sound-Muskoka, Ont.) did not appear as a witness but last week responded to the committee’s recommendations by stating that the government would expand the designated public office holder’s list and will “consider” the committee’s other recommendations.
“I want Mr. Clement to come and explain why he decided to ignore the key recommendations or what’s his timeline for responding to those recommendations?” said NDP MP Charlie Angus (Timmins-James Bay, Ont.), who said he would put forward a motion at the committee calling on Mr. Clement to appear. “As far as I can see, he’s totally ignored the issues that were brought up again and again and again and he’s come up with stuff that wasn’t even dealt with at committee. He had an opportunity to show Canadians that he was serious about closing loopholes, but right now it seems like it’s a joke.”
The House Ethics Committee reviewed the Lobbying Act under a mandatory five-year review and made 11 recommendations to improve the act.
In its response to the committee report, the government said last week that it supports two recommendations: making sure people who meet with DPOHs are listed on monthly communications reports, rather than simply only the most senior person in charge regardless if they met the DPOH or not; and maintaining the five-year ban on lobbying activities for DPOHs after leaving office while consolidating post-employment restrictions under a single authority.
Mr. Clement said that the first proposal would increase the monthly communications’ reports accuracy and transparency and would not increase an administrative burden on lobbyists.
Mr. Clement also noted in his response that the second proposal would bring “further clarity to the post-employment regime for public office holders” and that “the government will consider this matter further, taking into account any associated recommendations from the required Parliamentary-led legislative review of the Conflict of Interest Act.”
Mr. Clement said the government “will continue to study” three major recommendations, including eliminating the controversial 20 per cent rule in which DPOHs can still lobby without registering if their activities are below 20 per cent of their overall duties; putting the administrative review process into law; and giving the lobbying commissioner the ability to fine lobbyists in breach of the law.
For the other six recommendations, Mr. Clement said the government “concurs with the intent” and “will consider means of implementing them that maximize their effectiveness while minimizing administrative burden.”
Liberal MP Scott Andrews (Avalon, Nfld.), a member of the House Ethics Committee, said it was “very frustrating” that Mr. Clement is not taking the report seriously.
“The minister wouldn’t even come before our committee. We tried to get him to come before our committee, but his schedule wouldn’t allow it. Then he comes up with a suggestion that we need to expand it to 1,000 more public servants when we didn’t hear that testimony at all,” he told The Hill Times last week. “It’s kind of frustrating because you do this work, and they just nonchalantly brushed it off.”
Both Mr. Angus and Mr. Scott said the government’s response is weak and shows that it is not serious about improving the lobbying legislation when it came to power on a promise to close loopholes.
“They’re not serious about this, because now it’s their friends who are getting backroom influence,” Mr. Angus told The Hill Times. “We have a Lobbying Act without teeth and Tony Clement has once again failed to meet the ethical standards this government promised.”
Mr. Angus noted that if the government were serious, Mr. Clement would have announced that the majority-governing Conservatives were going to eliminate the 20 per cent rule as well as allow the lobbying commissioner the power to fine lobbyists.
“The big issue when we studied the Lobbying Act was the 20 per cent threshold. They didn’t touch that. Everybody wants that closed because that’s where the big backroom deals are. You know, an ex-Cabinet minister who makes one phone call to a buddy in the Prime Minister’s Office carries a lot more weight than the hardworking, lowly staffer who goes around 40 hours a week or 50 hours a week, so everybody said, ‘Close that loophole.’ Why didn’t they?” Mr. Angus said, adding that he doesn’t believe the government has any intention to bring legislation in for the recommendations they are “considering.”
“In politics, when they say they’re going to look at it and they’re going to think about it, that means it’s going off to the great adios. It’s going to the ethical graveyard like all other initiatives to put real teeth into holding the backroom boys to account,” Mr. Angus said. “It’s the same old same old, the old style politics, and it’s a broken promise. Stephen Harper promised Canadians if nothing else he would clean up Ottawa, and they’re not serious.”
John Capobianco, president of the Public Affairs Association of Canada and senior vice-president of lobbying firm Fleishman-Hillard, said the government’s response was surprising.
“Our group was against the five-year ban. We thought the five-year ban was unreasonable, so I was a bit surprised that the minister wouldn’t challenge the committee’s recommendation on that one,” he said. “We do wish the five-year ban was reduced and was more reasonable and in line with the provinces which is one year, or at least tiered in some cases.”
Mr. Capobianco said he was “pleased,” however, that the government supports having only one authority determine post-employment rules. “The fact that they’re going to go to a single authority is positive,” he said. “We agree with that particular concept, so you don’t have multiple people deciding what the issue is.”
The Government Relations Institute of Canada, the other national lobbying association, said that while “on balance” it agrees with the government, in principle, the devil is in the details.
“There are a lots of details still to come,” GRIC said in a public statement. “We will have to see the actual legislation before we can fully assess what the government’s response means to the day-to-day business of the government relations sector in Canada. GRIC will be especially interested in how the government handles the question of which officials will be considered designated public office holders under the new legislation. There seems to be a suggestion that that list may have some subjective elements to it, and GRIC maintains the rules should at all times be fair, predictable, and balanced.”
Natalie Hall, a spokesperson for Lobbying Commissioner Karen Shepherd, said the commissioner “is pleased that the government has tabled its response to the report of the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics. The commissioner looks forward to reviewing the response in detail.”
Mr. Andrews said last week that the government should be doing more to improve the Lobbying Act. Mr. Clement announced the changes to the DPOH list so that he could say the government is acting on something, Mr. Andrews said, adding that he does not know what the full impact will be from the expanded list.
“I have no idea, because it’s so minimal that it’s not a problem. We know that most decisions are made at the DPOH level and the most influence is at the DPOH level, so why expand it?” Mr. Andrews said.
“They only want one little sound bite to make it look like they’re doing something when they have no intentions of enacting any of the serious recommendations. Keep in mind, the majority of the recommendations came from the commissioner herself. All parties, including the government decided they were good recommendations and now the minister comes back and says this is what we want to do and we’ll look at the other ones. If you’re serious about it, come forward with some serious legislation on it.”
In a statement, Mr. Clement said that the government is taking “strong and unequivocal action” on the issue. The government will now have to introduce legislation to change the Lobbying Act.
“We take the committee’s recommendations seriously and we are committed to taking appropriate action to improve transparency and accountability, but without creating unnecessary administrative burden,” Mr. Clement said. “The government is committed to ensuring that there is balance amongst the act’s objectives.”
Original Article
Source: hill times
Author: Bea Vongdouangchanh
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