B.C. school severs ties to lobbyist

College of New Caledonia president says official went ‘beyond mandate’

The president of a college in northern B.C. says he has no idea why the school’s interim executive director of communications quietly registered himself as a lobbyist last month given the government’s clear position on the relationship between lobbyists and post-secondary institutions.

Henry Reiser, the president of the College of New Caledonia, says he learned that Kevin Brown, an established public relations specialist who the school hired last spring on a salary of $7,500 per month, had registered to lobby the deputy minister of advanced education after receiving an email from the government flagging it as an issue.

That email was likely prompted by queries Tuesday from Postmedia about Brown’s lobbying activities, which, according to B.C.’s registry of lobbyists, centre on the school’s $1.8 million budget surplus. Listed as Brown’s lobbying target is Sandra Carroll, deputy minister of advanced education, and also a member of the school’s board of governors.

Reiser said he called Brown after learning about his actions and terminated his contract with the school. He stressed that Brown had acted without the school’s knowledge or consent and confirmed that Brown did not and would not receive any kind of payment from the school for any so-called lobbying activities.

“He went way beyond the mandate of the contract,” said Reiser. “We have absolutely no need for a lobbyist.”

The hiring of government lobbyists by post-secondary institutions emerged as a hot-button issue last year after several controversial cases of the practice were raised in the legislature. One of those cases involved the $177,000 Kwantlen Polytechnic University spent on a B.C. Liberal-connected lobbyist to assist the school with its “government relations.”

In response, Andrew Wilkinson, the minister of advanced education, issued a stern directive to all post-secondary institutions that effectively banned them ever again hiring government lobbyists.

Wilkinson said he also learned of the latest case on Tuesday, the news prompting him to issue another reminder to his staff about the government’s directive.

“I gather what happened is an individual was retained to perform communications work for the College of New Caledonia and they became somewhat overzealous and decided to register as a lobbyist, which was clearly inappropriate,” Wilkinson said. “So that relationship has been terminated.”

NDP leader John Horgan questioned Wilkinson’s claim that he only learned of the lobbying activity this week and also suggested that the only reason action had been taken was because the arrangement had been discovered.

“If they hadn’t been caught, I wonder how much money they would have spent on a lobbyist to tell them what to do with the money they have left over from their budget,” said Horgan. “He (Wilkinson) made such a big deal out of saying ‘This shall not happen again’ … and now we have him saying ‘I just found out about it’ … it’s not credible.”

Brown, of Kevin Brown Communications, is also registered to lobby the government on two other unrelated files. He did not return a request for comment.

(They) became somewhat overzealous and decided to register as a lobbyist, which was clearly inappropriate. ANDREW WILKINSON