For some reason it makes me nervous when I hear that people who sometimes make life difficult for the government are being “reviewed.” And it makes me even more nervous when it is happening completely in the shadows.
On March 3rd the Speaker of BC’s Legislature announced the creation of a panel to review the work of the eight independent, Statutory Officers of the Legislature. These Officers are the Auditor General, the Chief Electoral Officer, the Conflict of Interest Commissioner, the Information and Privacy Commissioner, the Merit Commissioner, the Ombudsperson, the Police Complaint Commissioner and the Representative for Children and Youth.
This can’t have been a very loud announcement because it received no coverage in the media and I can’t even find it on the legislative website. Only Vaughn Palmer has covered it and then only in his blog.
The Auditor General and the Representative for Children and Youth in particular have consistently raised troubling questions for the government and a review that looks at their mandates has the potential to reduce their mandates. The Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services reviews the budgets of Legislative Officers. The Clerk assistant of the Legislature tells me that:
“Over time, concerns have been expressed in that forum and elsewhere by Members (MLAs) and the Statutory Officers themselves to the effect that overlapping and conflicting mandates exist and it would be timely for an arms-length review to examine the subject.”
The four member review panel is led by a former Alberta Deputy Minister. Two other members are former provincial deputy ministers. The fourth member is former BC Auditor General George Morfitt. So three of the four members have probably had run ins with Statutory Officers themselves. The panel is supposed to report to the Speaker on April 15th.
The review was authorized by the Legislative Assembly Management Committee and the Clerk Assistant says this is the body that will “most likely” consider its findings. This, at least, is encouraging because this Committee is made up of both NDP and Liberal House Leaders, the Caucus Chairs, the Chief Government Whip and the Speaker. Not balanced but at least it’s not a Cabinet Committee.
Legislative Officers offer an important window on government giving us access to government information we could never get otherwise. The Ombudsperson and the Representative for Children and Youth impose an accountability that can be awkward for government.
These people all do important work and this “review” deserves more attention than it has been getting. We need to make sure the watch dogs don’t get leashed.
Julie // Apr 10, 2010 at 8:32 pm
Any watchdog needs eyes in the back of their heads, if they are watching, Campbell and Hansen. This entire province desperately needs a review. Hopefully the review panel will see the catastrophy in this province. Good grief, the most important of all is, children in poverty, must be taken care of first. Single mothers who earn $8.00 per hour, can’t possibly feed her children with that kind of wage. Nor can single mothers on Social Assistance. That is a crime against humanity, that Campbell and Hansen have committed. Those two should be in prison, and that is exactly where they belong. I am spreading the news right now.
Tom Kertes // Apr 13, 2010 at 10:31 pm
Government benefits by having measures in place to hold government bodies to account, since these forms of accountability, even when critical of the government, are inherently about the “system working.” Politicians should keep this in mind before doing anything to undermining their own accountability measures. The public benefits as well, since it’s hard to have policies be effective without multiple forms of accountability, including from the opposition, from the media, from non-governmental watch dogs and interest organizations, and from inside-the-government officers as well. When those in power forget that their power is in part derived from what may seem like constraints on that power they risk overstepping and losing what power they had. Hopefully, for our sake, those in power can see how accountability is ultimately in their interests, especially when looking beyond the immediate and short-term horizon.