Canada's Inheritance

"Public office holders shall not act, after they leave public office, in such a manner as to take improper advantage of their previous public office."  Conflict of Interest and Post-Employment Code for Public Office Holders

One wonders why it is that former prime ministers of Canada and former cabinet ministers do not have the dignity to retire themselves from active political life.  Since the kind of active politics they seem to engage in - and they are not alone in this type of engagement; it attracts former provincial premiers as well - effectively demonstrates they are not averse to selling their former elite status to the highest bidder.  Usually that results in joining some prestigious law firm, and then helping them in their lobbying efforts.

The most egregiously transparent individual to engage in just such specious public service has been Jean Chretien.  Who, famously as prime minister, assembled a number of "Trade Canada" missions which he headed, taking along eager Canadian business heads and government bureaucrats to China to pave the way for future deals with that emerging economic giant.  Diversifying, in a very real manner, Canada's traditional trade dependence on the United States.

Generally speaking, Canada hasn't too much to complain about relating to American observation of human rights.  For the most part, it is the United States' perversity in taking its trade with its neighbour and largest trading partner for granted, treating Canada in a careless, off-hand manner.  Not, despite the North American free trade agreements, even respecting the very details so carefully agreed upon, ever seeking their own advantage to Canada's disadvantage.

All's fair in trade and war, with the signatories becoming antagonists when it might seem the other country has an unbalanced advantage, and the larger, more powerful of the partners managing to pull rank to the sizzling resentment of the junior partner.  It made practical sense, the Government of Canada, told its detractors, to trade with China despite its human rights record, because rubbing national psyches together would eventually result in China feeling the moral pressure to become more human-rights-sensitive.

The issue of Canada doing business with China rather than bypassing those opportunities, invoking self-respect disallowing Canada to become enmeshed with an unabashedly corrupt society whose government oppresses its people belongs in the confessional.  Where the penitent claims there was little other choice, because if he didn't do it, someone else would - and take the potential benefit - and what would that avail one's moral scruples?  Ethical but poor.

But then there's an additional issue, that of influential politicians of the lawmaking, executive elite leaving office and seeking to profit themselves by selling their official entree and expertise gained at public expense.  There are laws for the specific purpose of preventing any such betrayal of trust.  The 2004 Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons; the 2006 Conflict of Interest and Post-Employment Code for Public Office Holders; the 2007 Conflict of Interest Act.

For that matter, Canadians of distinction who have been appointed by the Prime Minister to sit in the Senate, that 'chamber of sober second thought', may do so, even while they are otherwise engaged in professional life or as board members of any number of organizations or businesses.  And Canadian Senators proceed, as though there is no conflict with their public office and the salary they receive therefrom, in lobbying for special interest groups.

As matters stand now, a new boldness in circumvention - simply by ignoring the ethics involved and the laws enacted to prevent conflicts of interest, perceived or real - prevails among former public office holders and elite bureaucrats who have retired or otherwise left their office and official attachment.  Because trade and business ties with China loom so large and profitably, this is where the enthusiasm for post-employment appointments and careers focus.

And therein lies an additional problem.  China has always engaged in espionage activities; political and industrial.  Infiltrating for the profit of obtaining information at the very highest political and manufacturing levels in every sphere of another country's business.  This is what China is expert at, inclusive of cyber-espionage.  Canada's own security agencies have pointed out repeatedly what China is suspected of being engaged in.

The price to pay for gaining access to Chinese markets for Canadian trade and services should not impact on Canada's security, nor should formerly public officials make inroads into that market to personally profit themselves in their indecent haste to gain wealth on the basis of their insider status of having made enriching contacts in their political lives to open doors to future commercial gain.

Trade and business do not really have to fully sacrifice ethics at the expense of self-respect and national security.  Nor should we hesitate to think twice and really hard about Chinese investment in Canada's natural resource industries to the point where we are no longer capable of exerting full control of the country's inheritance.