Local candidate responds to Ethics Commissioner's findings on SNC-Lavalin
By Contributor
“Focus on the systems!”
The Ethics Commissioner has released findings from the investigation into the SNC-Lavalin affair, and has found the conduct of the Prime Minister to be in violation of the Conflict of Interest Act.
Green Party Candidate Tara Howse acknowledges that the SNC-Lavalin affair was a catalyst for her entering politics. As an interdisciplinarian, Howse has always asked questions about the system and processes that lead to a particular outcome.
“It’s important to recognize that ethical conduct in government is not a new issue. Ethical concerns have plagued the federal government since its inception. Regardless of the ruling party, we have seen questionable conduct from PMs and MPs. This is ‘politics as usual’ and the responses have predictably been the same — indignation and attack. It’s important to reiterate that this is not an isolated event. Google “Canadian federal government scandals” and there are pages that come up.“
“We need to be focusing on the systems that allow this to keep happening. The Green Party has set out very clear ideas in the Vision Green document (Section 6.2, Increasing government accountability and ethical conduct), to address these issues. One simple solution is ethics training, training that many private workplaces already provide. We need to strengthen lobbying regulations and make the access to that information easier to disseminate. The Green Party is also committed to updating the Accountability Act and the Access to Information Act to ensure more openness in government activities.”
“I believe in doing politics differently. Criticizing and attacking are easy. Identifying and implementing practical solutions is significantly harder. The Green Party has a clear vision on how to improve ethical conduct in our MPs. We must learn from these system errors and elect voices that can advocate for process changes.”
