N.B. codes of conduct allow for degree of council secrecy not possible under N.S. rules

Under New Brunswick rules, the public can be kept in the dark when their local officials face discipline — an approach far less open than one adopted next door in Nova Scotia. 

In Strait Shores, in eastern New Brunswick, a councillor was temporarily suspended after an investigation that was kept from the public and was later found to have violated due process. 

In the northern municipality of Heron Bay, which includes Dalhousie and Charlo, council suspended Mayor Normand Pelletier and, as Radio-Canada reported, has refused to publicly say why.

And in Sunbury-York South, the municipality has not publicly shared details of why Mayor David Hayward was suspended at a recent meeting.

Questions about due process have also arisen in Grand Lake, where a councillor was suspended in April following an investigation that never let her respond to the allegations she faced.

But if those four municipalities had been in Nova Scotia, recent legislation would have required details to be made public, following a clearly outlined due process for everyone involved in the investigations. 

Last October, Nova Scotia adopted a new code of conduct for municipal elected officials, which acts as a blanket policy for all 49 municipalities in the province.

That's different from New Brunswick, where the Local Governance Act gives municipalities some guidelines that must be in their code of conduct but leaves it up to each council to create and implement their own version.

"The Nova Scotia code is clearer and avoids ambiguity like the one we have in New Brunswick," said André Daigle, a municipal law lawyer in Dieppe who's been working with municipalities and local planning commissions for more than 30 years.

Daigle said municipalities are left "in a vulnerable state because of the void that they have to fill themselves with the code of conduct."

Because of this, there are minor variations among the codes of New Brunswick councils. 

The Nova Scotia code clocks in at 3,971 words, New Brunswick's has 898 words. Nova Scotia also mandates regular training on the new code for all elected officials, which is something the New Brunswick Union of Municipalities had called for.

For procedural fairness, the Nova Scotia code requires that a council member who is the subject of the complaint be given an opportunity to review and respond to information in an investigator's report. Details about who the investigator is and their contact must also be public. 

And when imposing a sanction on a councillor, council must consider whether the member's contravention was intentional, a first-time offence, and whether the member has taken any steps to remedy the issue.