Morneau’s actions legal, not ethical

Editor: Just a wee comment on the Morneau affair. Mary Dawson, while I have it on good sources, is a bright lawyer, but she is still a lawyer.

And lawyers generally see the world through the portals of the law, which in court may be a good thing.

As Canada’s ethics commissioner however she fails to see the broader issue; she does not move before stage four reasoning in the Kohlberg schema.

In the design of our government back in the day, the fundamental ethical basis was that the governing should govern as they would wish to be governed – in other words, rule by the golden rule.

Had Dawson used this perspective (known as Stage Five reasoning) she would have quickly seen that using a holding company that a person solely owns as a vehicle for shielding investments is not shielding at all. It is simply using legal semantics to attempt to dodge a fundamental ethical dilemma.

Both Finance Minister Bill Morneau and Dawson have acted unethically and well below the standard of conduct that we should expect from those who rule over us.

It is neither fair nor appropriate for either to continue to use a legal perspective when they both know that democratic government requires a higher and broader standard of behaviour, let alone better level of moral reasoning.

I’m disappointed, once again, that sunny ways seem to be blinding the perpetrators to the sunburn they are giving to ethical leadership.

Glenn W. Sinclair, adjunct professor – ethics, Concordia University , Edmonton