New Brunswick conflict-of-interest rules re-enter the spotlight

An accusation that New Brunswick’s housing minister is in a perceived conflict of interest has put the spotlight back on the rules governing lawmakers identified by past provincial watchdogs. 

Glen Savoie, the interim leader of New Brunswick’s Progressive Conservatives, says David Hickey's role as landlord of a Saint John based anti-homelessness group could spur questions of a conflict should the group be awarded provincial funding. 

However, perceived or apparent conflicts of interest are not covered by the Members Conflict of Interest Act, despite repeated recommendations from past legislative officers to include them.

Savoie said that Hickey was in a “real and perceived” conflict, but when pressed by reporters to identify how he thought Hickey was in violation of the act he said it was more of a perceived conflict.

“By the simple fact that they are his tenant, they have an inside track towards money,” he said. “Perhaps there are other organizations that should get it.”

“So it’s not necessarily about a benefit to the minister but the perception that monies are not going where they possibly should.”

CBC News previously reported that Hickey’s tenant-landlord relationship with Fresh Start Services has been cleared by integrity commissioner Charles Murray, and Hickey says he’s been careful to go beyond the letter of the law to avoid any appearance of conflict.

Savoie’s accusation “has no merit, is based in complete falsehood and is just not true,” Hickey told reporters on Nov. 6. 

The application of the conflict-of-interest legislation governing lawmakers is fairly narrow, restricting them from making decisions that they know or reasonably should know will further their “private interest or to further another person’s private interest.”

Former integrity commissioner Alexandre Deschenes wrote in a 2018 annual report that adding the apparent conflicts to the act was “long overdue.”

His predecessor, conflict of interest commissioner Patrick Ryan, had advocated the same change in a review of the act prepared for the legislature.

Deschenes turned down an interview request but said in an email that he “still feels very strongly about the recommendations made in previous reports that I had a privilege of signing.

“I still do not understand the politicians’s reluctance to include the ‘apparent conflict of interest’ in the legislation.”

In 2017, former cabinet minister Donald Arseneault resigned his seat after sparking controversy for accepting a lobbying job while sitting as a backbencher. Even though the unusual situation didn’t violate the conflict-of-interest rules of the time, then-premier Brian Gallant ultimately said that Arseneau would have to choose.