Double Dipping Charitably

"I couldn't pay a lot of attention to the restaurant -- politics is a full-time job. I sold it last year. We couldn't make it work. We decided to sell rather than lose money.
"It's a 24-hour job and it is very difficult to own and run a business and fully participate in that.
"I find it hard just being a parent as well as a member of Parliament."
NDP MP Jasbir Sandhu, Surrey North, B.C.

"Members of Parliament are allowed to engage in outside activities as long as they are able to fulfil their obligations under the code."
Lyne Robinson-Delpe, assistant commissioner, Office of the Conflict of Interest &Ethics Commissioner

Mr. Sandhu, it seems, took his elected position as a parliamentarian seriously enough to want to do the job right, to render unto that particular Caesar its due. He found it simply not possible to continue to operate his family business, their My Village Indian Cuisine restaurant had to go; he made his free-will choice, and it was to ensure that Canadians, and in particular the voters of Surrey, B.C. got their tax-money-worth of his $160,200 salary.

It isn't actually a known, the details of most parliamentarians' activities outside of the House of Commons, nor what some of them might conceivably earn over and above their salaries as Members of Parliament. Some come to Parliament through elections with their former occupations on the side. The 'code of conduct' doesn't have any impact on MPs' other preoccupations or occupations outside of parliament.

When Paul Martin became prime minister the code was altered to convenience him. As owner of the family enterprise, Canadian Steamship Lines, Mr. Martin recused himself in a sense, of possible issues of conflict of interest by transferring authority from himself to his sons in the operation of the business. Before then, MPs were forbidden by a stronger code of even the appearance of conflict of interest, according to Duff Conacher, director of Democracy Watch.

With Prime Minister Paul Martin in charge, the 'appearance of' conflict of interest clause was loosened, to reflect the restriction to pure conflict of interest. But that wasn't the only point of contention with the Right Honourable Paul Martin; there was the issue of avoidance of paying Canadian taxes, and employing Canadians which with CSL International was exemplified by flying flags of convenience; Liberia, Cyprus, the Bahamas and Vanatu.

Moral conflicts of this kind seem to plague the Liberal leadership. There was Jean Chretien's infamous Shawinigate scandal, when he placed pressure on the president of the federal Business Development Bank of Canada to extend a $2-million loan to the man who bought the Auberge Grand-Mere hotel and golf club and the-then Prime Minister was concerned about getting his share of the profit from selling the hotel and golf club.

And then there is the issue of an MP who just happens to be the new darling of the electorate, the now-new-leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, who as a paid MP, occasionally took leave of the House of Commons to honour his Speaker's Spotlight speaking contracts at $20,000 a pop and more. Not as an MP, he hastens to exculpate himself, but as a private citizen. Private citizen Justin Trudeau speaking to charities and banking hefty speaking fees.

Private citizen Justin Trudeau playing truant-hooky from the House of Commons, paid for attendance there, and paid as well by charities supported by taxpayers. Even appearing at events where MPs representing the Conservatives and the NDP spoke alongside him at events where they appear free of charge since they're already paid by their MP salaries, while Prime Ministerial-hopeful Trudeau appears as a private individual alongside his colleagues, collecting a fee.

Clinging to the manta that he has "never charged anyone a single penny" while speaking as an MP.