Brison Pushes Port Authority To Reveal Expenses

By Andrew Macdonald

Kings-Hants Liberal MP Scott Brison has introduced a bill to force the Halifax Port Authority to release an account of its monthly expenses, something it has not been doing on a regular basis, despite an authority assertion it takes transparency seriously.

The freedom to access bill that Brison introduced this week calls on government, agencies and Crown corporations to be more accountable.

The upshot of the legislation is that Canadian port authorities that rent land from Ottawa will have to detail their monthly expenses, including overseas travel, on their websites.

After the bill was introduced this week, the port authority did release expenses to May, but before that it had been some time since the Halifax port released its travel expenses on its website. The last such entry, before this week’s bill was introdcued, was posted for expenses in 2016.

The lack of reporting expenses monthly by the HPA goes against a personal directive from Brison who upon going into Trudeau cabinet as Nova Scotia’s point man in Ottawa a year and half ago directed HPA CEO Karen Oldfield to begin releasing monthly expenses.

“The new proactive publication requirements would apply to all the institutions currently covered by the Access to Information Act, including departments, agencies, administrative tribunals and boards, Crown corporations, and other institutions such as Port Authorities”, said Ottawa this week in briefing notes..

“The Prime Minister’s Office, Ministers’ offices, Senators and Members of Parliament and administrative institutions that support Parliament and the courts would also be subject to these requirements”, added the federal government.