Blaney attended the annual conference of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police in Quebec City on Aug. 19, nearly three weeks after the election began.
During the writ period, the federal government is supposed to operate under what’s known as the “caretaker convention,” with ministers deferring work to departmental officials where possible and avoiding any government business that might be interpreted as political in nature.
The CACP, however, is registered to lobby Blaney and other government officials in support of Bill C-51, the anti-terrorism legislation; firearms policy; counter-terrorism; and other issues.
The group says it wasn’t seeking any special considerations from Blaney at the meeting in Quebec.
“This was not lobbying in the sense of asking for anything,” said Tim Smith, the lobbyist for the group who reported the meeting to the federal lobbying commissioner.
“Every year, at our AGM, we invite the Minister of Public Safety to address the Chiefs of Police,” Smith said in an email. “This year was no different. The invite had been made in March without the expectation that our AGM was to take place during an election.”
Blaney’s chief of staff, Frédérik Boisvert, also attended. The theme of the conference – radicalization and terrorism – made Blaney, who represents a Quebec City seat, an obvious choice to invite, Smith said.
“It was natural for him to discuss this with us.”
A request for comment from Blaney’s office was not returned.
Lobbyists are required to report all communication with public-office holders within 30 days. Since the election began on Aug. 2, they have reported contacts with four other cabinet ministers, but all of these were written correspondence initiated by the lobbyists.
The Banff Lake Louise Hotel Motel Association wrote to Citizenship and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander on Aug. 26, about a policy change that limited how long young Australians could work in Canadian resorts under the Temporary Foreign Workers program. Alexander did not reply.
The Calgary Zoo reported contacting Defence Minister Jason Kenney, Western Development Minister Michelle Rempel, Multiculturalism Minister Tim Uppal and a larger group of Calgary-area Conservative candidates on Aug. 4. The zoo’s director of external relations, Len Wolstenholme, said the contact with them was limited to an emailed invitation to an upcoming event. The candidates declined the invitation because of the election call.
The zoo is seeking “major capital infrastructure funding to update, renew or replace exhibits and facilities” and is looking to Western Development Canada to help develop investment by Pacific Rim donors, according to its lobbyist registration.
The government’s adherence to the caretaker convention was reiterated in a web post by the prime minister’s department, the Privy Council Office, last month, with a warning to cabinet ministers.
“In the context of an election, they must be especially vigilant with respect to the distinction between official government business supported by departmental and portfolio resources, and partisan political activities, taking care to avoid even the appearance that departmental and portfolio resources are being used for campaign purposes.”
The Citizen could find only one reported contact between a cabinet minister and a lobbyist during the 2011 election campaign, when the Island Corridor Foundation, a non-profit group that owns railway tracks on Vancouver Island, was in contact with then-aboriginal affairs minister John Duncan.
Lobbyists reported five contacts with Liberal MPs during the 2011 writ period, including then-leader Michael Ignatieff, who had contact with the Victorian Order of Nurses of Canada five days after the campaign began.
Original Article
Source: canada.com/
Author: GLEN MCGREGOR
No comments:
Post a Comment