The government announced L’Heureux’s appointment on the same day it started advertising for a replacement for the first budget watchdog, Kevin Page, whose five-year mandate expires March 25.
The timing has political watchers and PBO supporters speculating about what the government has up its sleeve, especially when Treasury Board President Tony Clement’s office said just weeks ago that the legislation governing the office does not allow for an interim appointment.
L’Heureux is taking over as the Conservative government prepares to table the budget and begin the process to get it approved by Parliament.
At the same time, the long-awaited court case to clarify the budget office’s mandate is scheduled for March 21 and 22, and some speculate that L’Heureux was put into the job to pull the plug on that case, which the government has opposed from the start.
“By appointing her, she would have the full authority to legally kill that case … and could issue instructions to withdraw the suit, which would be consistent with what the government has said publicly about the lawsuit,” said Ian Lee, a professor at Carleton University’s Sprott School of Business who has studied the PBO since it was created.
Lee says the appointment could be the first step in weakening the PBO without the political fallout the government would face if it simply scrapped the office.
“I’d say the government has a plan to incrementally emasculate the PBO to make it less controversial and the first step is the appointment of the chief librarian who may cancel the legal action and then recruit someone docile and obedient, which in turn will cause the exit of the staff and the PBO will migrate into an office similar to the parliamentary library’s research branch.”
Conservative Sen. Hugh Segal is among those who feel the office was hamstrung from the start when Page was put “in the role of just another researcher under the thumb of the parliamentary librarian.” The promise of a PBO was not for a “new staffer” in the library, he said in a Senate debate last week.
“I blame that decision on those in the Privy Council Office who have worked since that office was created decades ago to dilute parliamentary accountability for civil servants, Crown corporations and ministers,” he said. “I blame them for the perverse way in which the PBO was inserted under the tutelage of the librarian. That would be like making the chief trauma nurse in an emergency ward report to the hospital’s head of parking.”
The office, created by the Conservatives in the Federal Accountability Act, has been shaped by Page, who has been a thorn in the government’s side from the day he took the job.
With only a couple of weeks left in the post, Page is fighting for the office in the kind of appeal that infuriates the government, urging the media and Canadians to “stand up” for the office and save it.
“The current PBO is leaving town,” he told the Hill Times.
Former Finance executives Pete DeVries and Scott Clark have predicted that a “dark period” for the PBO will begin when L’Heureux takes over.
They said the librarian’s search for a replacement will drag on and the government will start “de-clawing” the PBO until the independent-minded office slowly atrophies and disappears.
“Reports will not get done and the Parliamentary Budget Office we know will probably quietly disappear,” DeVries and Clark wrote in their blog.
Their grim predictions come as the court case to clarify the office’s mandate — and whether it has the right under its “power of direct request” to seek information from departments on the government’s sweeping spending cuts — is set to get underway.
The speakers of both the Senate and House of Commons, who oversee the Parliamentary Library, have waded into the case and argue the legal action breaches parliamentary privilege and is beyond the jurisdiction of the Federal Court.
On top of that, the Senate is debating a motion from independent Sen. Anne Cools that essentially makes the same privilege argument the speakers have made in court. If a Senate committee debates the motion and decides Page’s court action violates their privilege, he could be found in contempt of Parliament.
It’s highly unusual, however, for the court and legislative branch to be considering the same issue in tandem, which could put the Senate in an unprecedented constitutional dilemma if the court rules one way and the committee decides another.
“I need not underscore how this undercuts the separation of powers in our constitutional system,” said Liberal Sen. Mobina Jaffer in a recent debate on the motion.
Meanwhile, the appointment of L’Heureux has led to widespread speculation about the fairness of the selection process for Page’s replacement, which she is also leading.
As chief librarian, L’Heureux chairs the selection committee that will pick three candidates to present to the prime minister, who will choose the new PBO.
Some say this puts her in a blatant conflict because as chief librarian she reports to the speakers of the House and Senate, but as PBO she is supposed to be independent.
“We have no disagreement with the chief librarian but rather with the government and the cavalier way they handle the accountability of Canadians’ tax dollars, which was their campaign pledge,” said NDP Finance Critic Peggy Nash. “The simplest thing would have been to continue Page’s term or temporarily appoint one of the senior people at the PBO who could easily have stepped in.
“I would be surprised if this was her idea,” said Nash. “It’s not a very comfortable place these days for senior public servants.”
Nash said Clement misled the House when he said the law didn’t allow for an interim PBO and then he turned around and appointed one. It’s unclear if the interim appointment could be challenged, but presumably the PCO has determined it is on safe ground.
Nash said the job is too important to be in the hands of the librarian who will do it part-time on top of her other duties.
“They knew (Page’s) term was coming to an end and the process is lengthy to find the right person … so it’s strange they let the time run out on this position before they woke up and thought of getting someone else. That, to me, is disrespectful to the goal of accountability which the government claims to support.”
One senior bureaucrat said L’Heureux is caught between a rock and a hard place because the speakers and PCO can call the shots. He said her temporary leadership will be closely watched by the media and the opposition and L’Heureux won’t want to see the PBO gutted or disappear under her watch.
L’Heureux declined to comment until after her appointment takes effect.
Lee said the government’s goal is to “keep the PBO if necessary, but not necessarily the PBO.”
“They know they would create a firestorm if they tried to shut it down or legislate it out of existence. NGOs, academics, the OECD, would come out of the woodwork in the court of public opinion, so if they’re stuck with the PBO, they will have an ersatz PBO, one in appearance and not in reality.”
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: KATHRYN MAY
No comments:
Post a Comment