In these times of hyper-partisanship and an “all’s fair in love, war” and now apparently, politics, as the environment we find ourselves in today we often seem to go one step forward and two steps backward in the practice of democracy.
In 2019, integrity commissioners were given the authority to review allegations of conflict of interest under the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act (MCIA). Before that, matters concerning conflicts could only be dealt with through court applications. While individuals who believe the MCIA has been contravened can still apply to a judge for a determination on the matter directly, the legislation now provides for integrity commissioners to conduct an inquiry into an alleged contravention and provides them with the discretion to bring the matter to a judge themselves.
The important change here is that complaints can be made without cost to the complainant. Previously, for most people, lodging a formal complaint against a municipal elected official involved hiring a lawyer and investing considerable treasure in time and money to take a complaint forward.
Over the past half-decade, the integrity commissioners of municipalities have plied their trade and delivered verdicts—but at what cost? While the bar of coughing up personal lucre to call elected officials to account was setting things too high, we may well have come to a point where the bar has dropped too far.
Both Elliot Lake and Espanola have seen warring councillors take to the lists courtesy of their respective integrity commissioners at extreme cost to the ratepayers. As anyone who has litigated is only too well aware, lawyers are expensive. That’s no slight on lawyers, who must acquire significant credentials in order to bill their hours, but it is a plain fact. The cost can quickly escalate into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Unfortunately, it is becoming more and more common for citizens (and electoral opponents) to take their grievances to the integrity commissioner without merit. The recent case of two Central Manitoulin councillors is a case in point. It should have been clear from the start that any reasonable person would have concluded the councillors held no pecuniary interest when they voted on a service club donation.
When a person files a complaint with the integrity commissioner it should be for the purposes originally intended by the legislation—not as a whip or retribution unrelated to the matter being referenced.
Running a municipality is expensive business. In the case of most Island municipalities, a major investigation can cost as much as one percentage point on the tax levy. That is a scary proposition.
The burden of ensuring the MCIA is being upheld has been effectively downloaded onto property taxpayers. Those taxpayers are already overburdened with provincial responsibilities at a time when many are struggling just to make ends meet.
It may well be time for the province to take a close look at how integrity commissioners are playing out in the wild. A formal review of the process would inform the legislature as to whether the law is worth the powder and enable tweaking to ensure the process is not being misused to great cost.
