It's interesting to go to
Hansard, the official record of proceedings in the legislature, and see what five members said on the day the
Green bill was hastily passed, along with a couple of a minor amendments no one explained.
Take the parliamentary father of the bill, finance minister Tom Marshall, formerly the justice minister and attorney general:
On the purposes of the bill:
Fourthly, to establish clear rules with respect to salary, clear rules with respect to allowances and resources, clear rules for members and to provide for a mandatory review of these rules at regular intervals, and the review also to take place in public.
Another purpose of the legislation is, "provide for clear and timely disclosure in relation to operations of the House of Assembly and statutory offices, including members’ salaries, pensions, allowances, resources and severance payments, that is consistent with the public interest".
On rules:
The commission, in particular, is required, in 20.(1) (e), to "make and to keep current rules respecting the proper administration of allowances for members and reimbursement and payment of their expenditures in implementation of subsection 11(2) of..." the legislation, which I will refer to shortly.
There is an interesting clause here, Mr. Speaker, in 20.(3) which says, "...the financial and management policies of the government shall apply to the House of Assembly and statutory offices except to the extent that they may be modified by directive of the commission."
That ensures that there is a set of rules in effect. If the House of Assembly Management Commission fails to make rules in a certain area, the rules of the government shall apply until modified and amended by a director from the commission.
It is also important to note, Mr. Speaker, that a change shall not be made in the level of amounts of allowances and resources provided to the members of this House except in accordance with a rule that has been made by the Management Commission, and that rule shall not be effective, Mr. Speaker - and this is extremely interesting - the rule that will govern the operation of those of us in the House of Assembly, a particular rule, will not be effective unless that rule is first brought before this House of Assembly and a resolution adopting it by this House of Assembly has, in fact, been passed.
That will make these rules certainly transparent and open to the people of the Province.
And on moving second reading:
Mr. Speaker, this legislation -
AN HON. MEMBER: Wonderful legislation.
MR. T. MARSHALL: This wonderful piece of legislation has been introduced, has been recommended by the Green report, Chief Justice Green, and I think it is important that this is a first step in the renewal, to renew public confidence in the institution of this House of Assembly and in the Members of the House of Assembly who, as I indicated earlier, the majority of which are dedicated to their Province, they are dedicated to their communities, they are dedicated to this House of Assembly and this legislation will help them to perform their duties and perform their services in a transparent and accountable manner and in the public interest to the people of this Province.
With that, Mr. Speaker, I will move second reading of this legislation.
Or take, the Opposition House Leader, Kelvin Parsons a former minister of justice and attorney general:
There is no doubt, of course, that we need to have a good foundation. We need to have good rules, and Judge Green, true to form, of course, has made it very detailed, has made it very comprehensive for that very reason. That in the future everything will be absolutely open, transparent and, most importantly I believe, accountable. There will be accountability here - it is fine to have a system, but there is no point in a system that you cannot account for it and you cannot let the people know and the public - particularly in this case, where we are all servants of the public - know what you are doing, how you are doing it, what are the rules you play by, and make sure that you do play it by the rules. That is what this will do on a go-forward basis.
He neglected to mention that the basis will go forward from October 9, not June 14.
He did, however, hint a little bit at it, if one had been paying really close attention:
There is no doubt, as well, that albeit, Bill 33 will pass and become law today, or in the near future. There is no doubt, as well, that there is still certain little tweaking, shall we say, that has to be done in terms of implementation. There are some things that must need to be done. I understand, again, there has been a good rapport with Chief Justice Green in arriving at that decision in terms of implementation, and so it should be. It is good to see. I understand he met, as recently as this morning, with some representatives of all three caucuses represented in this House and answered any questions and concerns they had and so on. So, it is good to see that rapport continues, albeit he has submitted his report, and whatever needs to be done will be done, must be done and it will be done in such a way that it is proper and that, no doubt, there will not be anything done that does not meet with the approval and consent of Chief Justice Green and his committee. It is good to see that we have reached this point.
But then Parsons made some other comments that surely would have led people to conclude - as many did - that The Rules would be in force along with the rest of the legislation:
I understand, in fact, that even the rules piece that he recommended, we will be seeing an amendment come forward here today so that even the rules that he suggested, the very detailed, specific rules as to what you can and cannot do, and how you record it and so on, that will be introduced here today as well as part of this bill, a schedule to this bill, and so it should be.
I can say to the Government House Leader right now that, on the understanding that amendment is coming forward, we will certainly be in favour of that. As far as we can see there will not be any need for detailed discussions or whatever in Committee with respect to enforcing and having those rules become a part of this bill as well.
Accountability.
Transparency.
Clarity somehow was left behind. As both NDP leader Lorraine Michael and Government House Leader Tom Rideout have said, they both understood what was going on. Too bad they never bothered to tell the rest of us.
In the House of Assembly, Lorraine Michael sensed a certain irony to the whole proceeding:
There is a bit of an irony, and I think we should acknowledge it, that one of the things Chief Justice Green mentions in his report is the fact that sometimes legislation may get passed very quickly in the House, and sometimes quick passage of legislation can lead to things happening inadvertently, decisions getting made and after the fact recognizing, oh, yeah, well maybe we weren’t on top of that when the decision was made. I have seen some of that in going through some records with regard to the House.
Elizabeth Marshall, the former auditor general spoke at considerable length about the new audit provisions of the legislations. On the rules, she said this:
Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, the new detailed rules were also prescribed by Justice Green. These are laid out in the report and these also have been tabled here today in the House of Assembly. Really, that is a starting point for the Members of the House of Assembly and for the Internal Economy Management Commission, that these are starting rules. Of course, the commission, if they follow a certain process they may change the rules, but the approval process is something that has to be very open and it has to be made public. Also, any changes in the rules, which are made by the commission, have to come forward to the House of Assembly in a public forum for ratification.
Not a word, from Ms. Marshall on the delayed implementation of the rules.
Yvonne Jones, a senior Liberal spoke to the bill and did address the issue of ethics and donations, saying this:
Mr. Speaker, let’s talk about the ethics piece for just a moment, because there are a number of things in this bill that speak to the conduct of members and the ethics of members. One of the things that the Chief Justice is recommending is that there be no more donations given out by MHAs, and despite what I wrote in my survey, Mr. Speaker, that I wanted to continue to give donations - I will admit it - I am prepared to live by the recommendations that the Chief Justice have laid out for us. I understand his rationale behind it, I understanding his reasoning behind it and I am more than willing to accept that, as I have told him personally myself.
Not a word again about why the implementation of the rules was being delayed.
Five members of the legislature, some of them long-serving members who hold or who have held senior positions in Liberal or Conservative ministries, did not once note the reasons why the rules were being delayed until October 9.
Finance minister Tom Marshall did give the implementation date, in passing,as he closed Second Reading, just as surely as his colleague Tom Rideout introduced the amendment.
But there was no explanation as to the reasons, and simply put, that's just not good enough. It isn't good enough when every other comment by every other member who spoke to the bill left the clear and unmistakeable impression that Chief Justice Green's rules were in effect along with all the other provisions of the Green bill.
There was much talk of restoring public trust and confidence in the legislature. That's just another way of saying public support.
Well, in public relations there's an old definition of what public relations is all about. PR, as it goes, is about gaining and maintaining public support.
In order to gain support, people have to know what you are doing and why. They have to know.
In order for them to know, the people with the information have to tell the people - like you and me - who don't have it.
If the members don't tell us, how can we know?
It's that simple
And obviously some people still just don't get it.
-srbp-
