Wednesday, 27 February 2019

New Brunswick's secret conflict regime for unelected officials

---------- Original message ----------
From: "Murray, Charles (Ombud)" <Charles.Murray@gnb.ca>
Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2019 18:16:15 +0000
Subject: You wished to speak with me
To: "motomaniac333@gmail.com" <motomaniac333@gmail.com>

I have the advantage, sir, of having read many of your emails over the years.


As such, I do not think a phone conversation between us, and
specifically one which you might mistakenly assume was in response to
your threat of legal action against me, is likely to prove a
productive use of either of our time.


If there is some specific matter about which you wish to communicate
with me, feel free to email me with the full details and it will be
given due consideration.


Sincerely,


Charles Murray

Ombud NB

Acting Integrity Commissioner




https://twitter.com/DavidRayAmos/with_replies





Replying to and 49 others
Methinks its incredibly ironic that the former integrity commissioner Alexandre Deschênes is in a conflict of interest with me N'esy Pas?


https://davidraymondamos3.blogspot.com/2019/02/new-brunswicks-secret-conflict-regime.html





https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/nb-secret-conflict-regime-1.5034474



New Brunswick's secret conflict regime for unelected officials



18 Comments
Commenting is now closed for this story.




David Amos  
David Amos
Methinks it incredibly ironic that the former integrity commissioner Alexandre Deschênes is in a conflict of interest with me N'esy Pas?








David Amos 
David Amos
Methinks folks should checkout my lawsuit about being illegally barred from legislative properties while running for public office now many years later NB Power used that malicious nonsense to prevent me from being an intervener in EUB Hearings in which the politician I ran against was appointed to sit on the the board Seems that I should sue the Crown again N'esy Pas?




Marc LeBlanc 
Marc LeBlanc
The patronage pipeline.It's been around for decades.


David Amos
David Amos
@Marc LeBlanc Its as old as peoplekind












Richard Cyr 
Richard Cyr
You could have sent an e-mail to Murray Brewster rather than write this. He's your #1 culprit.

The man is on his 3rd or 4th article about the Vets Affairs tax debacle and still hasn't mentioned anyone involved. That's extremely poor journalism.


David Amos
David Amos
@Richard Cyr Methinks your #1 culprit is Trudeau The Younger At least nobody can deny that his former Attorney General is gonna speak her truth today (Yea Right) while Trump's former White House Counsel yaps it up in Congress before he goes to jail

Truth is stranger than fiction N'esy Pas?











Marc LeBlanc 
Joseph Vacher
Francophone Games


David Amos
David Amos
@Joseph Vacher NB Power


Rosco holt
Rosco holt
@Joseph Vacher
Forestry











Marc LeBlanc 
Rosco holt
It's the way for politicians/ parties to get away we most backroom scams..... er, schemes.


David Amos
David Amos
@Rosco holt YUP











Marc LeBlanc 
Mac Pitt
NB Government should listen to what Alexandre Deschênes has said, this guy knows what he is talking about.


David Amos
David Amos
@Mac Pitt Methinks all the politicians know that the lawyers Alexandre Deschêne and the interim integrity commissioner Charles Murray know more than folks think they do. However they are never gonna blow the whistle on their own severe lack of integrity N'esy Pas?












Marc LeBlanc 
kelly sherrard
This province is so out of control. We have gotten so used to gov't offices running poorly that we no longer are surprised when something explodes and the garbage leaks out. We continue to have gov'ts that fail to have a mandate to clean up gov't and get rid of the dead wood that is at ground zero of many issues. if anyone tried to clean it up, people would turn on them because people in gov't work to protect themselves and their friends against being fired. The problem lies with upper management ... it needs to be cleaned out.... a major purge. Bullying is a major factor.


David Amos
David Amos
@kelly sherrard What can anyone do when apathy rules the day?











Marc LeBlanc 
Rod McLeod
Good call. Too many policies and decisions are set by unelected individuals. The elected people are just the couriers delivering the news to the public and then taking the heat when things don't work out.


David Amos
David Amos
@Rod McLeod Close but no cigar





New Brunswick's secret conflict regime for unelected officials

No way for public to know if non-elected officials ever in conflict, unless complaint filed in court


There's no way for the public to know if deputy ministers, Crown corporation CEOs or executive assistants to ministers were ever in conflict, unless a complaint is filed in court. (Jacques Poitras/CBC)



New Brunswick's most powerful non-elected government officials are subject to conflict-of-interest rules that are weak, outdated and shrouded in secrecy.

Deputy ministers, Crown corporation CEOs and executive assistants to ministers are required to file conflict declarations--but those documents remain confidential, unlike those filed by MLAs.

That means there's no way for the public to know if any non-elected official was ever in a conflict, unless a complaint is filed in court.

The law also includes no penalties for officials who don't file declarations, and isn't even clear about who it covers, according to a 2014 ruling by a Court of Queen's Bench judge who oversaw the act at the time.

And its list of Crown corporations is also out of date, meaning the CEOs of Opportunities New Brunswick, Cannabis NB and Service New Brunswick, among others, are not subject to its requirements.

Amend law, says former integrity commissioner


Former integrity commissioner Alexandre Deschênes said in his final report before his retirement that the government should amend the law.

He said non-elected officials should be under the same regime as MLAs, who report to the commissioner.

"My view is, and I've made that view known for some time, is that system ought to be abandoned as soon as possible," he told CBC News in a recent interview.


Former integrity commissioner Alexandre Deschênes said non-elected officials should be under the same regime as MLAs. (Jacques Poitras/CBC)
"The system just doesn't work."

One of Deschênes's predecessors as conflict commissioner, Patrick Ryan, repeatedly levelled the same criticism during his tenure as commissioner.

"Alex is absolutely correct," Ryan said in a brief interview. "It bugged me."

David Ferguson, a retired clerk of the executive council--the top civil service position in the province--called it "bizarre" that there is no penalty for not filing a conflict declaration.

"If you ignore it, you get away scot-free, which seems to be a real problem with the act," he said.

Province reviewing act


Government spokesperson Tyler Campbell said the province is reviewing the act and is looking at all the issues that have been raised.

"That work is currently underway," he said.

He said some of the Crown corporations not covered by the act have their own conflict policies, but the province will look at having the same rules apply to all of them.
Who knows? Who doesn't know? Who follows it up? No one follows it up, apparently.- David Ferguson, retired clerk of the executive council
Under the Members' Conflict of Interest Act, MLAs file annual disclosure statements to the integrity commissioner, revealing their investments, assets, business interests and loans. An abridged version is made public.

But a separate law, the Conflict of Interest Act, applies to senior non-elected officials. They file their disclosures not to the commissioner, but to a sitting judge designated by the government.
There's no requirement that their declarations become public.

Deschênes says involving a sitting judge compromises the independence of the judiciary because the judge must interact with civil servants and, in some cases, help them prepare blind trusts for investments.

"I have difficulty making it compatible with an independent judiciary," he said.

Judge mum on declarations


The current designated judge, Justice Barbara Baird of the New Brunswick Court of Appeal, did not respond to a request for information on the declarations she has reviewed.

On Jan. 28, CBC News sent Baird a list of questions on how many officials are subject to the act now, how many disclosures she has received from them, how many inquires she has conducted and how many breaches she has found and how many orders she has issued.


The Court of Appeal of New Brunswick is the highest court in the province and generally sits in Fredericton. (CBC)
As of Tuesday, Baird had not answered or even acknowledged the questions. The law does not require her to release any information to the public.

Ferguson wouldn't say whether the declarations should be public, but he said it's "important at some point that there's something on the record that says, 'here's a list of everyone who filed and these have been done.'

"As opposed to how it's up in the air right now: if someone doesn't file, who knows? Who doesn't know? Who follows it up? No one follows it up, apparently."

As clerk of the executive council, Ferguson said he depended on the act to deal with potential conflicts among his fellow deputy ministers.
"I didn't particularly need to know or want to know what the personal business of one of my colleagues was," he said. "I assumed the conflict of interest declaration had been filed, and any issue that had been addressed by the judge was a private matter."

Most deputy ministers are career civil servants with no history of business investments, Ferguson said, but there's been a trend in recent years to recruit from the private sector.

"There perhaps may be more possibilities of a conflict of interest arising because of that.

Deschênes says the designated judge system is so awkward that most judges want to avoid the role.

"I was a judge for more than 30 years and I know as a fact that there's no appetite on the part of the judiciary to perform those tasks," he said.

Judge role problematic


Two Court of Queen's Bench judges who held the position "basically resigned" because they found the legislation and the role problematic, Deschênes said.

One of them, Jean-Paul Ouellette, made his complaints public in a 2014 ruling on a ministerial assistant who violated the act by not filing a new declaration.

Jimmy Bourque, an executive assistant to a Progressive Conservative cabinet minister, was the owner of a company in a blind trust that received almost half a million dollars in government contracts.

Ouellette ruled that Bourque's failure to file a disclosure violated the act, but in his ruling he complained that no one compiles a definitive list of the deputy ministers, Crown CEOs and executive assistants subject to the act.


The law's list of Crown corporations is also out of date, meaning CEOs of newer Crown corporations such as Cannabis NB, aren't subject to its requirements. (Julia Wright / CBC)
"I do not have any information on or list of individuals … who are required to disclose," he wrote. "No one compiles such a list, and there is no process for informing the individuals in question that they have breached the disclosure provisions of the Conflict of Interest Act."

Ferguson agreed that there should be "administrative support" so that the designated judge always has an up-to-date list of who the act applies to.

Ouellette also complained that the act doesn't allow the designated judge to track who is not complying with the law and doesn't include any sanctions--meaning he wasn't able to punish Bourque for the violation.

"Such is the Act," the judge wrote in his ruling.

The regulation accompanying the act lists eight Crown corporations whose CEOs are subject to the law, including New Brunswick Liquor, NB Power, and the Regional Development Corporation.

Two on the list no longer exist, and 13 other Crown corporations that operate now are not listed in the regulation.




Jacques Poitras
Provincial Affairs reporter
Jacques Poitras has been CBC's provincial affairs reporter in New Brunswick since 2000. Raised in Moncton, he also produces the CBC political podcast Spin Reduxit. 



CBC's Journalistic Standards and Practices





---------- Original message ----------
From: Justice Website <JUSTWEB@novascotia.ca>
Date: Mon, 18 Sep 2017 14:21:11 +0000
Subject: Emails to Department of Justice and Province of Nova Scotia
To: "motomaniac333@gmail.com" <motomaniac333@gmail.com>

Mr. Amos,
We acknowledge receipt of your recent emails to the Deputy Minister of
Justice and lawyers within the Legal Services Division of the
Department of Justice respecting a possible claim against the Province
of Nova Scotia.  Service of any documents respecting a legal claim
against the Province of Nova Scotia may be served on the Attorney
General at 1690 Hollis Street, Halifax, NS.  Please note that we will
not be responding to further emails on this matter.

Department of Justice

>
> ---------- Original message ----------
> From: David Amos motomaniac333@gmail.com
> Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2017 09:32:09 -0400
> Subject: Attn Integrity Commissioner Alexandre Deschênes, Q.C.,
> To: coi@gnb.ca
> Cc: david.raymond.amos@gmail.com
>
> Good Day Sir
>
> After I heard you speak on CBC I called your office again and managed
> to speak to one of your staff for the first time
>
> Please find attached the documents I promised to send to the lady who
> answered the phone this morning. Please notice that not after the Sgt
> at Arms took the documents destined to your office his pal Tanker
> Malley barred me in writing with an "English" only document.
>
> These are the hearings and the dockets in Federal Court that I
> suggested that you study closely.
>
> This is the docket in Federal Court
>
> http://cas-cdc-www02.cas-satj.gc.ca/IndexingQueries/infp_RE_info_e.php?court_no=T-1557-15&select_court=T
>
> These are digital recordings of  the last three hearings
>
> Dec 14th https://archive.org/details/BahHumbug
>
> January 11th, 2016 https://archive.org/details/Jan11th2015
>
> April 3rd, 2017
>
> https://archive.org/details/April32017JusticeLeblancHearing
>
>
> This is the docket in the Federal Court of Appeal
>
> http://cas-cdc-www02.cas-satj.gc.ca/IndexingQueries/infp_RE_info_e.php?court_no=A-48-16&select_court=All
>
>
> The only hearing thus far
>
> May 24th, 2017
>
> https://archive.org/details/May24thHoedown
>
>
> This Judge understnds the meaning of the word Integrity
>
> Date: 20151223
>
> Docket: T-1557-15
>
> Fredericton, New Brunswick, December 23, 2015
>
> PRESENT:        The Honourable Mr. Justice Bell
>
> BETWEEN:
>
> DAVID RAYMOND AMOS
>
> Plaintiff
>
> and
>
> HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN
>
> Defendant
>
> ORDER
>
> (Delivered orally from the Bench in Fredericton, New Brunswick, on
> December 14, 2015)
>
> The Plaintiff seeks an appeal de novo, by way of motion pursuant to
> the Federal Courts Rules (SOR/98-106), from an Order made on November
> 12, 2015, in which Prothonotary Morneau struck the Statement of Claim
> in its entirety.
>
> At the outset of the hearing, the Plaintiff brought to my attention a
> letter dated September 10, 2004, which he sent to me, in my then
> capacity as Past President of the New Brunswick Branch of the Canadian
> Bar Association, and the then President of the Branch, Kathleen Quigg,
> (now a Justice of the New Brunswick Court of Appeal).  In that letter
> he stated:
>
> As for your past President, Mr. Bell, may I suggest that you check the
> work of Frank McKenna before I sue your entire law firm including you.
> You are your brother’s keeper.
>
> Frank McKenna is the former Premier of New Brunswick and a former
> colleague of mine at the law firm of McInnes Cooper. In addition to
> expressing an intention to sue me, the Plaintiff refers to a number of
> people in his Motion Record who he appears to contend may be witnesses
> or potential parties to be added. Those individuals who are known to
> me personally, include, but are not limited to the former Prime
> Minister of Canada, The Right Honourable Stephen Harper; former
> Attorney General of Canada and now a Justice of the Manitoba Court of
> Queen’s Bench, Vic Toews; former member of Parliament Rob Moore;
> former Director of Policing Services, the late Grant Garneau; former
> Chief of the Fredericton Police Force, Barry McKnight; former Staff
> Sergeant Danny Copp; my former colleagues on the New Brunswick Court
> of Appeal, Justices Bradley V. Green and Kathleen Quigg, and, retired
> Assistant Commissioner Wayne Lang of the Royal Canadian Mounted
> Police.
>
> In the circumstances, given the threat in 2004 to sue me in my
> personal capacity and my past and present relationship with many
> potential witnesses and/or potential parties to the litigation, I am
> of the view there would be a reasonable apprehension of bias should I
> hear this motion. See Justice de Grandpré’s dissenting judgment in
> Committee for Justice and Liberty et al v National Energy Board et al,
> [1978] 1 SCR 369 at p 394 for the applicable test regarding
> allegations of bias. In the circumstances, although neither party has
> requested I recuse myself, I consider it appropriate that I do so.
>
>
> AS A RESULT OF MY RECUSAL, THIS COURT ORDERS that the Administrator of
> the Court schedule another date for the hearing of the motion.  There
> is no order as to costs.
>
> “B. Richard Bell”
> Judge
>
>
> Below after the CBC article about your concerns (I made one comment
> already) you will find the text of just two of many emails I had sent
> to your office over the years since I first visited it in 2006.
>
>  I noticed that on July 30, 2009, he was appointed to the  the Court
> Martial Appeal Court of Canada  Perhaps you should scroll to the
> bottom of this email ASAP and read the entire Paragraph 83  of my
> lawsuit now before the Federal Court of Canada?
>
> "FYI This is the text of the lawsuit that should interest Trudeau the most
>
>
> ---------- Original message ----------
> From: justin.trudeau.a1@parl.gc.ca
> Date: Thu, Oct 22, 2015 at 8:18 PM
> Subject: Réponse automatique : RE My complaint against the CROWN in
> Federal Court Attn David Hansen and Peter MacKay If you planning to
> submit a motion for a publication ban on my complaint trust that you
> dudes are way past too late
> To: david.raymond.amos@gmail.com
>
> Veuillez noter que j'ai changé de courriel. Vous pouvez me rejoindre à
> lalanthier@hotmail.com
>
> Pour rejoindre le bureau de M. Trudeau veuillez envoyer un courriel à
> tommy.desfosses@parl.gc.ca
>
> Please note that I changed email address, you can reach me at
> lalanthier@hotmail.com
>
> To reach the office of Mr. Trudeau please send an email to
> tommy.desfosses@parl.gc.ca
>
> Thank you,
>
> Merci ,
>
>
> http://davidraymondamos3.blogspot.ca/2015/09/v-behaviorurldefaultvmlo.html
>
>
> 83.  The Plaintiff states that now that Canada is involved in more war
> in Iraq again it did not serve Canadian interests and reputation to
> allow Barry Winters to publish the following words three times over
> five years after he began his bragging:
>
> January 13, 2015
> This Is Just AS Relevant Now As When I wrote It During The Debate
>
> December 8, 2014
> Why Canada Stood Tall!
>
> Friday, October 3, 2014
> Little David Amos’ “True History Of War” Canadian Airstrikes And
> Stupid Justin Trudeau
>
> Canada’s and Canadians free ride is over. Canada can no longer hide
> behind Amerka’s and NATO’s skirts.
>
> When I was still in Canadian Forces then Prime Minister Jean Chretien
> actually committed the Canadian Army to deploy in the second campaign
> in Iraq, the Coalition of the Willing. This was against or contrary to
> the wisdom or advice of those of us Canadian officers that were
> involved in the initial planning phases of that operation. There were
> significant concern in our planning cell, and NDHQ about of the dearth
> of concern for operational guidance, direction, and forces for
> operations after the initial occupation of Iraq. At the “last minute”
> Prime Minister Chretien and the Liberal government changed its mind.
> The Canadian government told our amerkan cousins that we would not
> deploy combat troops for the Iraq campaign, but would deploy a
> Canadian Battle Group to Afghanistan, enabling our amerkan cousins to
> redeploy troops from there to Iraq. The PMO’s thinking that it was
> less costly to deploy Canadian Forces to Afghanistan than Iraq. But
> alas no one seems to remind the Liberals of Prime Minister Chretien’s
> then grossly incorrect assumption. Notwithstanding Jean Chretien’s
> incompetence and stupidity, the Canadian Army was heroic,
> professional, punched well above it’s weight, and the PPCLI Battle
> Group, is credited with “saving Afghanistan” during the Panjway
> campaign of 2006.
>
> What Justin Trudeau and the Liberals don’t tell you now, is that then
> Liberal Prime Minister Jean Chretien committed, and deployed the
> Canadian army to Canada’s longest “war” without the advice, consent,
> support, or vote of the Canadian Parliament.
>
> What David Amos and the rest of the ignorant, uneducated, and babbling
> chattering classes are too addled to understand is the deployment of
> less than 75 special operations troops, and what is known by planners
> as a “six pac cell” of fighter aircraft is NOT the same as a
> deployment of a Battle Group, nor a “war” make.
>
> The Canadian Government or The Crown unlike our amerkan cousins have
> the “constitutional authority” to commit the Canadian nation to war.
> That has been recently clearly articulated to the Canadian public by
> constitutional scholar Phillippe Legasse. What Parliament can do is
> remove “confidence” in The Crown’s Government in a “vote of
> non-confidence.” That could not happen to the Chretien Government
> regarding deployment to Afghanistan, and it won’t happen in this
> instance with the conservative majority in The Commons regarding a
> limited Canadian deployment to the Middle East.
>
> President George Bush was quite correct after 911 and the terror
> attacks in New York; that the Taliban “occupied” and “failed state”
> Afghanistan was the source of logistical support, command and control,
> and training for the Al Quaeda war of terror against the world. The
> initial defeat, and removal from control of Afghanistan was vital and
>
> P.S. Whereas this CBC article is about your opinion of the actions of
> the latest Minister Of Health trust that Mr Boudreau and the CBC have
> had my files for many years and the last thing they are is ethical.
> Ask his friends Mr Murphy and the RCMP if you don't believe me.
>
> Subject:
> Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2007 12:02:35 -0400
> From: "Murphy, Michael B. \(DH/MS\)" MichaelB.Murphy@gnb.ca
> To: motomaniac_02186@yahoo.com
>
> January 30, 2007
>
> WITHOUT PREJUDICE
>
> Mr. David Amos
>
> Dear Mr. Amos:
>
> This will acknowledge receipt of a copy of your e-mail of December 29,
> 2006 to Corporal Warren McBeath of the RCMP.
>
> Because of the nature of the allegations made in your message, I have
> taken the measure of forwarding a copy to Assistant Commissioner Steve
> Graham of the RCMP “J” Division in Fredericton.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Honourable Michael B. Murphy
> Minister of Health
>
> CM/cb
>
>
> Warren McBeath warren.mcbeath@rcmp-grc.gc.ca wrote:
>
> Date: Fri, 29 Dec 2006 17:34:53 -0500
> From: "Warren McBeath" warren.mcbeath@rcmp-grc.gc.ca
> To: kilgoursite@ca.inter.net, MichaelB.Murphy@gnb.ca,
> nada.sarkis@gnb.ca, wally.stiles@gnb.ca, dwatch@web.net,
> motomaniac_02186@yahoo.com
> CC: ottawa@chuckstrahl.com, riding@chuckstrahl.com,John.Foran@gnb.ca,
> Oda.B@parl.gc.ca,"Bev BUSSON" bev.busson@rcmp-grc.gc.ca,
> "Paul Dube" PAUL.DUBE@rcmp-grc.gc.ca
> Subject: Re: Remember me Kilgour? Landslide Annie McLellan has
> forgotten me but the crooks within the RCMP have not
>
> Dear Mr. Amos,
>
> Thank you for your follow up e-mail to me today. I was on days off
> over the holidays and returned to work this evening. Rest assured I
> was not ignoring or procrastinating to respond to your concerns.
>
> As your attachment sent today refers from Premier Graham, our position
> is clear on your dead calf issue: Our forensic labs do not process
> testing on animals in cases such as yours, they are referred to the
> Atlantic Veterinary College in Charlottetown who can provide these
> services. If you do not choose to utilize their expertise in this
> instance, then that is your decision and nothing more can be done.
>
> As for your other concerns regarding the US Government, false
> imprisonment and Federal Court Dates in the US, etc... it is clear
> that Federal authorities are aware of your concerns both in Canada
> the US. These issues do not fall into the purvue of Detachment
> and policing in Petitcodiac, NB.
>
> It was indeed an interesting and informative conversation we had on
> December 23rd, and I wish you well in all of your future endeavors.
>
>  Sincerely,
>
> Warren McBeath, Cpl.
> GRC Caledonia RCMP
> Traffic Services NCO
> Ph: (506) 387-2222
> Fax: (506) 387-4622
> E-mail warren.mcbeath@rcmp-grc.gc.ca
>
>
>
> Alexandre Deschênes, Q.C.,
> Office of the Integrity Commissioner
> Edgecombe House, 736 King Street
> Fredericton, N.B. CANADA E3B 5H1
> tel.: 506-457-7890
> fax: 506-444-5224
> e-mail:coi@gnb.ca
>

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