As we get ready for another sitting week of Parliament, we are no closer to finding any kind of clarity or resolution to the issue of the suspension motions in the Senate. In fact, there are different stories being floated in the media – some that the Conservatives there are open to compromises in the motions, based on comments that Senator Claude Carignan, the leader of the government in the Senate, made. The PMO, meanwhile, is standing firm that they want the suspensions without pay – not that they actually have a say in the matter, given that the Senate is the master of its own destiny and not at the beck and call of the PMO (despite what many – including a handful of senators who haven’t learned better yet – may think). So that leaves the state of play still very much in motion as things get underway. Justin Trudeau, for his part, wants everyone involved to testify under oath, feeling that’s the only way everything will be cleared up. While Senator Cowan’s motion to send it to a committee would give an opportunity to summon the current and former PMO staffers involved, Parliamentary committees can’t summons Parliamentarians and force them to testify (because of privilege), so the really key players may yet be spared from testimony if that is the case. Law professor Carissima Mathen talks to CTV about the legal arguments in the Senate suspension motions. Tom Clark writes about how this is playing with the Conservative base, and how the push for swift action in the backrooms and behind closed doors is starting to look more like the Chrétien/Martin way of doing things, which is what the Conservatives rode into Ottawa promising to clean up.
Tag Archives: Auditor General
Roundup: Industrial espionage…or not
The Guardian writes that the Communications Security Establishment was involved in secret briefings to energy corporations, ostensibly to discuss threats to energy infrastructure, and they are tying this into the allegations that CSE was conducting industrial espionage on mining and energy in Brazil – even though the documents don’t show that. CSE did confirm that they meet with industry, but said that it has to do with protecting them against things like cyber-threats. There are even public records of such kinds of meetings here. It should also be noted that Canadian energy companies do have operations in countries like Cote d’Ivoire and Nigeria, which have had problems with stability and there would be threats to our operations and workers there. These facts weren’t enough to dissuade Thomas Mulcair, who said that there was “clear evidence” of industrial espionage, though that would be news to anyone else. The CBC’s Julie Van Dusen tried to get answers from the head of CSE in a walking scrum yesterday, but he wasn’t deviating from his talking points. (And kudos to the camera operator who filmed said walking scrum while walking backwards at high speed). James Fitz-Morris has a possible explanation for why Canada might be spying on Brazil’s energy officials.
Roundup: Visits to the Langevin Block
Yesterday in Senate-related news, the visitor logs of the Langevin Block – which houses the PMO – shows the dates of visits by Senators Mike Duffy, David Tkachuk and Irving Gerstein in the days around the news of Duffy’s audit, and leading up to the $90,000 cheque from Nigel Wright. It helps to further establish the timeline of who met with whom, as the investigation continues. Elsewhere, the Auditor General met with the Internal Economy committee and its audit subcommittee to discuss his forthcoming audit of the institution and its membership. The AG said that the audit will be “comprehensive,” but people shouldn’t think that it means “forensic,” because that’s not what his office does, and they don’t have the staff or expertise to do those kinds of audits. (That’s in large part why they get contracted out to Deloitte). The Internal Economy committee is also looking at an overhaul of the Senate communications office, which has shown itself to be unable to handle the increase in media requests given recent events, and their mandate is nebulous with too many masters. Fortunately, there seems to be an appetite to change this.
Roundup: Taunts and regurgitated priorities
Thomas Mulcair has decided to step into the fray over prorogation, and his contribution is that prorogation is fine and good, but suspending Parliament is not, and that since Harper is avoiding Parliament, he’s a coward. Because that’s raising the tone of debate, ladies and gentlemen.
Oh, look – Harper wants the throne speech to focus on the economy and middle-class families. I wonder where I’ve heard that one before? Oh, and safe streets? Tell me more! I’ve totally never heard any of this before. Why, it’s positively game changing!
Roundup: Charlie Angus’ distraction and vilification
At a press conference in Ottawa Friday morning, NDP MP Charlie Angus declared that he doesn’t think that the Auditor General should look at MPs’ expenses because the Senate is evil and stuff. No, really. If that wasn’t a more clear-cut case of distraction (and vilification), I’m not sure what is. The AG put out a statement outlining a few things about his forthcoming Senate audit – basically, it’s like any other audit, so stop asking him about it. Academics are hoping that this new scrutiny will sweep away the “old boys’ network” in the Senate, never mind that it’s been on its way out slowly for the past number of years as increasingly rigorous new rules have been put into place. Have similar rules been put into place on the Commons side? Well, we don’t know, because they’re not transparent, while the Senate is – not that you’ll hear Charlie Angus or Thomas Mulcair admit that. Meanwhile, it seems that Pamela Wallin was whinging about “media bullying” when they made Freedom of Information requests to Guelph University about her billing them for flights for her duties as chancellor, because you know, she’s the victim in all of this. The CBC looks at what’s next for Wallin, and also provides a fact sheet on Senators’ pay, and the key players in the expenses scandals. Meanwhile a group of psychologists – and Andrew Coyne – say that the Senate itself breeds a sense of entitlement, which doesn’t seem to explain why the problems are confined to a small minority, or why MPs and cabinet ministers fall into the very same kinds of entitled behaviours (if not even worse, because they’re the people’s chosen representatives, and a strategic genius to boot, and are therefore even more entitled).
Roundup: The Cult of the Auditor
In the wake of the audits of Senators Wallin, Duffy, Harb and Brazeau, and with much of the business in Ottawa in general, there has developed a Cult of the Auditor, be it the Auditor General, or the outside Deloitte auditors in the more recent examples. And why not? They’re not partisan, and they call it like it is. But as much as people decry the lack of accountability in politics these days, be it in the Senate or ministerial accountability, or whatever, they are immediately quick to rush to the say-so of auditors, who themselves are completely unaccountable. It’s a curious thing, but it’s one of the biggest problems that is infecting Canadian politics these days, which is reflected in the controversy around the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Rather than MPs doing their own work of scrutiny, they fob it off to the PBO now because they’re non-partisan and “credible,” and parties can hide their attacks behind those reports. It now becomes a game of “See! Even the AG/PBO/etc. says that these guys are terrible! Let us beat them with the sticks that others have provided for us without any means of accountability, because they are credible and non-partisan!” It’s an awful game, and it has utterly degraded our political discourse and capacity in this country. Auditors, or the PBO, are no longer seen to be doing the jobs that they were supposed to, but are becoming proxy ammunition in political games because the partisans can’t be bothered to do the heavy lifting themselves. And that is a problem, most especially if we are demanding accountability.
Roundup: About those “robust” audits
Two new reports from the Auditor General show that the honour system is alive and well in both the Commons and the Senate, and it was all just a cursory look without digging into any MP or senator’s expenses. While the Senate has been making reforms to their internal processes before the current spending scandals erupted, the Commons has not, and it seems that only Justin Trudeau has been championing a more robust audit process by the AG. To hear Thomas Mulcair tell the tale, as he was all spring, the AG did a thorough and comprehensive audit and found no problems, which clearly is not the case.
Roundup: The AG and the power of compliance
While Transport Canada went on record stating that three of the deficient areas found by previous audits were going to be rectified within a specified timeframe that had to do with an “extension” granted by the Auditor General’s office, the AG’s office said that they’re not in any position to grant any extensions because they don’t have enforcement mechanisms – it’s all Transport Canada’s responsibility to ensure compliance. So, yeah. Well done Transport. Elsewhere, Maclean’s has breakfast with the president of Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway, where he sort of clarifies some of his comments from the previous day.
Roundup: Denying consent for transparency
After QP yesterday, Justin Trudeau rose to seek unanimous consent for his four motions on greater transparency for parliament – MPs posting expenses, opening up Internal Economy, and calling in the Auditor General. None of them passed, and apparently it was the NDP who denied consent (though some reporters heard Conservatives dissent despite the party line being that they were in favour). What did pass was a motion from Nathan Cullen that would ban MPs from using their travel points to go to speaking gigs, as apparently the latest bout of Trudeau bashing is to assert that he apparently used his MP expenses to do speaking gigs, despite there not being any evidence to support this, and the fact that most speaking gigs include airfare as a standard part of the deal.
Roundup: Rathgeber wins the day
It really was Brent Rathgeber’s day yesterday, from the very start when CBC’s Laura Payton caught up with him at the airport, and he said a lot of wonderfully civically literate things about the role of backbenchers to act as a check on the executive, and how executive control nowadays has bled so far into the committee system that it is a threat to our Westminster-style democracy. Rathgeber explained more on his blog, and his intention to largely vote with the Conservatives going forward, but will evaluate all decisions on a case-by-case basis. At the press conference he called in his riding, he also put the boots to the PMO, basically saying that they run themselves without involving Harper, which really makes one wonder who is running the show, since they’re the ones writing the scripts that they expect the backbenchers to read. Colby Cosh looks at the seven Conservative MPs who were responsible for gutting Rathgeber’s bill in committee. The one who moved the amendments, Brad Butt, gave Huffington Post an excuse that it was to avoid big bureaucracy getting involved, and to try it at the most senior levels first, but it seems fairly nonsensical.