Trudeau having trouble finding replacements for watchdogs

Justin Trudeau is extending the terms of the federal ethics and lobbying watchdogs by another six months and relaunching the application process to find their replacements, The Canadian Press has learned.

It’s the third time the prime minister has given six-month extensions to ethics commissioner Mary Dawson and lobbying commissioner Karen Shepherd, both of whom were scheduled to leave their posts within the next few weeks. The move underscores the difficulty the Trudeau government has had in finding replacements for officers of Parliament, the watchdogs who are supposed to provide independent oversight over crucial matters like federal elections, government spending, ethics, lobbying, linguistic duality and access to information.

And it comes on the heels of Trudeau’s botched nomination of Madeleine Meilleur, a Liberal partisan and former Ontario cabinet minister, to the post of official languages commissioner.

Meilleur withdrew her nomination Wednesday after weeks of controversy over her partisan ties to the very government she was supposed to hold to account and amid opposition complaints that they weren’t consulted, as legally required for an officer of Parliament. A senior government source told The Canadian Press that Trudeau will send letters next week to opposition leaders, asking them what stakeholders they want consulted about the next ethics and lobbying commissioners and suggesting they encourage potential candidates to apply.

The source, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said the government will be posting online today a new “notice of opportunity,” inviting applications for the two posts.

In the meantime, Privy Council Office spokesman Paul Duchesne confirmed that Dawson and Shepherd, whose terms were originally supposed to expire a year ago, have agreed to serve until the end of this year.

Since taking office, Trudeau has had the opportunity to choose successors for five of the eight officers of Parliament - all but the auditor general and privacy and public sector integrity commissioners. So far, he’s filled none of the five slots. In addition to Dawson and Shepherd, he’s extended the term of information commissioner Suzanne Legault, which was to end this month, until the end of the year.

The post of chief electoral officer has been vacant for six months since Marc Mayrand retired in December. Mayrand gave advance notice last June of his intention to step down precisely because he believed “the early appointment of a successor to lead Elections Canada well ahead of the next general election (in 2019) is essential and should not be delayed.”

Yet, a full year later, there is still no new chief electoral officer.