“I am very pleased to see the court decision against the partisan action of the former Parliamentary Budget Officer and the leader of the NDP. This government created the position. We provide information on a regular basis and we will continue to do so,” said Prime Minister Harper (Calgary Southwest, Alta.) on Wednesday in Question Period in response to a question from NDP Leader Tom Mulcair (Outremont, Que.) who was part of former PBO Kevin Page’s Federal Court application.
Prime Minister Harper was responding to Mr. Mulcair’s question, “Will the Prime Minister finally show some transparency by requiring his ministers to provide all the required information?”
Following the court ruling, interim PBO Sonia L’Heureux said in a statement that the office will request the information needed to respond to Mr. Mulcair’s request. The requests for information were sent out last Thursday to 84 departments and agencies, with a May 10 deadline.
“We expect that the requested information will be duly provided by the government departments and agencies. If a dispute arises, the court has said it will be available to assist with its resolution,” Ms. L’Heureux said.
The Privy Council Office was unable to respond last week on whether PCO Clerk Wayne Wouters will allow DMs to comply with the interim PBO’s requests by deadline.
On Parliament Hill, opposition MPs said the ruling is an important victory for Parliamentary democracy because it upheld the PBO’s right to ask the government for the information it needs to do its job.
“I think the Parliamentary budget officer should feel very vindicated by that ruling,” said NDP MP Pat Martin (Winnipeg Centre, Man.).
The Parliamentary Budget Office asked the Federal Court to clarify its mandate after Mr. Page received a request from Mr. Mulcair to analyse how budget cuts would affect service delivery. Mr. Page had previously asked the government for documents on its spending plans and was mostly refused access because it said it was not within the PBO’s mandate. Before asking departments again for the information he needed to comply with Mr. Mulcair’s request, Mr. Page sought a reference application at Federal Court to see if his mandate allowed him to do so.
In his ruling last Monday, Federal Court Justice Sean Harrington said that because Mr. Page had not requested the documents in this particular case where Mr. Mulcair was the respondent, there was no controversy to settle which is why it was dismissed on a technicality.
“The questions are hypothetical and I decline to answer them on the grounds of non-justiciability,” Mr. Harrington wrote in his ruling. “I dislike dismissing applications on procedural grounds, but there are times when it is necessary to do so. This is one of those cases, as there is no live controversy.”
However, Mr. Harrington also clearly noted that “by establishing the position of a Parliamentary budget officer and enshrining his or her mandate in legislation, Parliament intended that independent, i.e., independent from government, financial analysis should be available to any Member of Parliament, given the possibility that the government of the day may be a majority government with strong party discipline.”
In intervening in the case, the House and Senate Speakers argued that allowing the Federal Court to clarify the PBO’s mandate would infringe on Parliamentary privilege. Mr. Harrington said that it did not.
“Neither on the basis of Parliamentary privilege nor on the principles of statutory interpretation has Parliament reserved for itself the right to answer Mr. Page’s questions. That task falls upon this Court,” he said. “If the legislation infringed upon Parliamentary privilege, and I say it did not, then such privilege was legislatively waived [in creating the PBO].”
Green Party leader Elizabeth May (Saanich-Gulf Islands, B.C.) told The Hill Times last week that it was “an extremely important case” because it reinforces Parliament’s supremacy.
“The decision of the Federal Court that the Parliamentary Budget Office was correct in assessing and pursuing the fundamental principle that the Parliament of Canada is superior to the executive within the government of Canada, that we have the right to this information, that we should not be passing budgets without adequate access to the background documents, if such background documents exist, and we have a right to insist on full evidence before the Cabinet so too does the Parliament and each individual Member of Parliament has rights to that information, … that suggests there’s a pulse left in Canadian democracy,” she said.
Treasury Board President Tony Clement (Parry Sound-Muskoka, Ont.) previously said that the PBO should be concerned with money spent, not money saved, and that Mr. Page was “overstepping” his mandate.
In response to the Federal Court ruling, Mr. Clement’s press secretary Matthew Conway told The Hill Times: “The Federal Court dismissed Kevin Page and Thomas Mulcair’s latest partisan stunt by throwing out their court case to review the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s job description. We are pleased that the Federal Court recognized that the PBO is a resource for all Parliamentarians, not just members of the opposition.”
Mr. Conway also noted: “Kevin Page would routinely ignore requests from Conservative MPs to estimate the financial cost of private members’ bills that were before Parliament. We look forward to appointing a Parliamentary Budget Officer that is a non-partisan, credible source of analysis on fiscal matters.”
In response, assistant Parliamentary Budget Officer Sahir Khan said that the office has worked with all MPs, regardless of party. He noted that on Sept. 29, 2011, Conservative MP Randy Hoback (Prince Albert, Sask.) moved a motion at the House Finance Committee that the PBO automatically provide analysis to the committee of private members’ business.
“Consistent with the legislated mandate of the Parliamentary budget officer and the motion cited above, the costing of private members bills, regardless of party affiliation, has been routinely provided to FINA [the House Finance Committee],” Mr. Khan said.
Liberal MP Scott Brison (Kings-Hants, N.S.) said that he doesn’t believe the government will turn over the information to the office. “This government continues to stonewall the PBO, and in doing so stonewalls Parliament itself. It’s failing not just to provide the information to the PBO, but to provide the information to Canadians,” he said.
Despite a year having gone by since Mr. Mulcair made the original request, Mr. Martin and Ms. May both said that finding out information for those budget cuts is still valuable.
“It was for legitimate purposes and the government has no excuse now not to release the information as requested,” Mr. Martin said. “The public has a right to know, and opposition MPs on behalf of the public have a right to know what their government is doing with their money. That’s the fundamental underlying principle here. The public has the right to know the impact of the policy decisions and the information associated with them.”
Ms. May said that if the departments do not comply this time around, she hopes the PBO will be back in Federal Court.
“I commend Tom Mulcair for stepping up and helping the Parliamentary Budget Office bring this forward and I’m also encouraged by the fact that the current interim PBO is going to pursue the matter and ask for those numbers,” Ms. May said. “So, I think it’s an extremely important court case.”
Original Article
Source: hilltimes.com
Author: BEA VONGDOUANGCHANHa
No comments:
Post a Comment