Ethics czar checking aide’s letter to CRTC
OTTAWA — A Conservative parliamentary secretary has intervened in the federal broadcast regulator’s deliberations on carriage of all-news services — just months after three colleagues landed in trouble for sending letters to the same court-like body.
In his Sept. 4 letter to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, Saskatchewan MP David Anderson urges the regulator to take a “much more market driven approach” to both news and entertainment channels.
Failing that, he says, the CRTC should make all national news broadcasters equally available on the TV dial and in cable packages.
“Canadians deserve to be presented with a diversity of views when it comes to interpreting the news,” writes Anderson, whose signature notes his position as a parliamentary secretary. “Sadly, only specific Canadian newscasters are now being guaranteed a convenient spot on basic cable.”
The broadcast regulator is reviewing rules for distribution of TV news specialty services, and solicited comments by Sept. 9. The review follows the rejection of a bid by Sun News Network, which lost $17 million last year, for mandatory distribution by cable and satellite providers.
Anderson was parliamentary secretary to the natural resources minister when he wrote the letter, and has since been promoted to parliamentary secretary to Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird. Parliamentary secretaries are considered public office holders under the federal conflict-of-interest law.
In January, ethics commissioner Mary Dawson admonished Finance Minister Jim Flaherty and two parliamentary secretaries — Eve Adams and Colin Carrie — for breaching the Conflict of Interest Act by writing letters to the CRTC in support of radio licence applications.
She noted that section nine of the act prohibits public office holders from using their positions to try to influence decision-making where doing so would improperly further the interests of another person.
In Flaherty’s case, Dawson also pointed out that he violated government guidelines for ministers and secretaries of state that forbid them from intervening with tribunals such as the CRTC on any matter that requires a decision in their quasi-judicial capacity. Dawson ordered the Conservative MPs to “refrain from writing any similar letters” without seeking approval from her office. Her office would not say whether Anderson had sought permission to send his letter.