Michael Harris asks a really good question: What, exactly, is Mary Dawson doing?
It’s time to either get serious about people who violate the ethical rules that govern elected officials — or shutter this largely worthless operation and spend its $7 million budget on something useful.
Dawson simply muddied the waters swirling around Bill Morneau:
Dawson came up with a beauty to describe this nonsensical state of affairs: she told Morneau that he wasn’t “required” to set up a blind trust.
But when the merde hit the fan, she explained that she had not advised Morneau not to create a blind trust. Ms. Dawson could teach an Actor’s Studio class in ass-covering. Contrast that with a comment made on background to iPolitics by a senior Liberal: “If the finance minister doesn’t need to set up a blind trust, who does? I don’t see how he survives this.”
And consider the fines she imposes on transgressors:
For that lapse, Morneau (a multi-millionaire) got slapped by Dawson (a high-paid civil servant) with a $200 fine. That’s a parking ticket for a politician who has demonstrated an unseemly fondness for loopholes and ‘ethical screens’. Who happens to be the finance minister.
When Harper cabinet minister Jason Kenney failed to report stock purchases made in his name. Kenney paid the princely sum of $100 for breaking the disclosure rules.
Dawson found that another Harper cabinet minister, Peter MacKay, was in “serious breach” of the conflict of interest guidelines on two occasions. Against the rules, MacKay held directorships in his father’s companies. MacKay’s knees must have wobbled when he got his comeuppance: a $200 fine.
The fine for jay walking in Nova Scotia is $687.50.
There is something seriously out of joint in Ms. Dawson's office.
Image: cbc.ca
14 comments:
The cynic could argue that Dawson is merely responding to the values of her true masters, Owen.
Her behaviour doesn't say much for her "independence," Lorne.
.. once upon a time.. after exuberant banality
a small group of us exited a notorious Halifax bar
and unable to stand up on fresh wet snowfall
instead, took to the street and schussed n carved
at high speed to our harbour hotel..
We passed beat cops clinging to lamp posts
& cop cruisers relaxed n resting gainst downhill curbsides
.. the moral of the story is..
once in a lifetime (one hopes)
You get a free & wild trip - as nobody can possibly 'catch you'
hell.. they can't even touch you..
'stop there!' haha .. catch the wind dude..
.. the difference is ..
- we had beaucoup points for style & creativity.. improv
- political animals practice this daily.. 12 hours a day
on dry roads in broad daylight & are rewarded accordingly
and they get us to pay for their limos ..
Stephen Harper once famously told his security team that he made the rules. It appears, salamander, that sentiment has affected politicians of all parties.
Bill has paid in my understanding close to half a billion dollars to be finance minister. You can take that two ways. I choose to think, he is really a public servant.
Contrast that with all the pols that never had a job and left the party millionaires..
Owen we must never forget the limo ride to the Taj Mahal. You cant make this stuff up.
Dawson did not give Morneau good advice, Steve. Nonetheless, Morneau should have known that, if there's one minister who can't afford a perceived conflict of interest, it's the finance minister.
I agree with the old adage about being above appearances. Today in this swamp we have a star candidate the CEO or Chair of some bigwig position guy running for office. No conflict of interest. Postmedia IMNO allegedly and without prejudice is a Republican front in Canada.
With our funded pension plan, funded health care, and gun laws we are like Syria on the border
do not doubt this. If Trump gets a second term regime change is comming to Canada. Because they allegedly want a refund for Mulroney and Harper.
Does Dawson actually know the rules? Does she actually think it is okay for her to make up rules?
Good question, Toby. It's a little hard to tell. Perhaps the rules are written so that they're open to interpretation.
.. the foibles, f'ups n failures of Trudeau Inc aside..
How should we look back at the late saint, Jim Flaherty..
What of his annual seance among the power brokers
a weekend getaway.. a retreat from his responsibility
and the destruction of Canada's environmental legislation..
Was that in conflict or not ?
The 'interests' after all were those of Canadians..
and generations to come..
but somehow he made it about the interests
of Big Oil Big Finance inc
Ol Joe Oliver was right there applauding
Trudeau/Morneau have done dick on a stick
to redress those crime by a captured Harper government..
How are they doing re the Poilievre 'Fair Elections' act
What of SARA.. the boreal caribou or wild salmon?
Any luck re the Great Election Fraud.. Sona et al?
The tailings 'pond' dam that burst ?
You know.. owned by the rich dude
that Rona Ambrose & her rodeo guy
spent some 10 days with aboard his super yacht..
If that was official 'feet to the fire'.. I call horseshit
and hiw does that rich turd get a free ride?
These are all boats that don't float..
Unexplained lapses that stink to high heaven..
I thought all these folks were 'public servants'
but it seems all a stroke job.. a rub n tug
at a 'massage parlor' .. called 'government'
Down south its the proverbial temple of Baal
& waitin on jeebuz to clear the money launderers
and fraudulent realtors out
Lip service seems the new trend.. and noise
neither of which I recall as an 'election promise'
You're right, salamander. The Dawson story is only a small part of a much larger picture. The central operating principle is that rank has its privileges. And those privileges come with the job -- the public welfare be damned.
Morneau was oblivious from the start. Look at his Economic Council from Feb last year. The cream of the Old Boys Network assembled, from overpaid university presidents to titans of industry, chaired by someone from a national accounting firm, those paragons of ethics. Yes, for the princely pay of a loonie a year and out of the goodness of their charitable hearts, they agreed to assemble in Ottawa now and then to plot out Canada's future economics/financial course, while gobbling sandwiches from the parliamentary cafeteria as penance for having it so good the rest of the year. "Hold the caviar on that egg salad roll, there, my good man, if you'd be so kind."
These folk are so far removed from the budgeting penury of the serfs, that in reducing the marginal rate of tax by a whopping 1.5% on the second bracket, while giving nothing to the poor because they're not middle class, they thought they were giving society a leg up. Jeez, wow. Brainpower is indeed a characteristic of our financial betters.
Dope for the masses by July next year? Well, the Senate harumphed on that citing their wisdom of years of experience and fake concern. I'm as ancient as most of those old geezers and was hoping to have a whuff myself before I shuffle on from this mortal coil. But Billy Blair, ex-cop and disapprover of anything that might be fun so loves inventing Rules, is in charge of this possibly seditious program and Morneau wants a buck a gram for being progressive. Tut-tutters from the social set downing multiple sherries at receptions in Hottawa on a regular basis are not sure at all that the masses really need legalized pot - it all seems a bit too much don't you think, some of these people don't shower every day, you know, dear. The government is in breach of various rulings on the Indigenous files, and Morneau cannot even work out the commonsense solution of a blind trust for himself. What a fine crew of people we somehow have lording it over us.
We get the government we deserve, I guess. And Scheer may or may not be better or worse, because how do you honestly decide if one pile of excrement over here is better than that pile over there? Well, they look a bit different up close - I guess. Oh yeah, well, would you look at that! The Con pile is steamier and has Rebel Media as its media think tank.
The Ethics Commissioner, meanwhile, seems to be the opposite of the Sheila Fraser auditor type, and who we should not forget, held Stevie Harper responsible and prevented him from being an even bigger ars*hole than he naturally wanted to be. Pity Dawson seems over-awed by the privileged for reasons unknown. Nice sinecure though, wouldn't have minded it meself.
The good news is that Catherine Mckenna had a toe-to-toe with some idiot from Rebel Media today at a press conference in Vancouver, and came off very well from my PoV.
BM
After awhile they all begin to sound the same, BM -- except, perhaps, Catherine McKenna. Don't call her Climate Barbie. We need more like her.
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