Isleifson’s three private member’s bills approved

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This article was published 02/06/2023 (1039 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Future candidates running for school boards and municipal councils in Manitoba will need to disclose whether they have been convicted of certain crimes after the passage of a Brandon MLA’s private bill this week.

Bill 230 was one of three private bills put forward by Brandon East Progressive Conservative MLA Len Isleifson during the current legislative session that received royal assent on Tuesday.

Going forward, candidates at the municipal level must issue a statement disclosing whether they have either pleaded guilty or been found guilty of any offence under the Criminal Code of Canada, the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act or the Income Tax Act.

These statements must then be posted on a website for the jurisdiction in question by its senior election official. Offences committed under the Youth Criminal Justice Act or the Young Offenders Act as well as offences a person have been pardoned for do not need to be disclosed.

“If you were to run federally, you are required to disclose,” Isleifson said in a Thursday phone interview. “If you were to run provincially, you are required to disclose. But up until now, you didn’t have to disclose if you were running for school board or municipal council.”

Though he said he hadn’t heard of any specific cases where the non-disclosure of a candidate criminal record posed a problem, Isleifson said he had heard concerns from residents about wanting to know more about the people running to represent them.

“My bill is not intended to stop anyone from running. It’s just to provide that level of transparency that you’re not going to be surprised by electing someone into a position and then finding out they have a criminal history,” he said. “Knowing ahead of time, you have the ability to make an educated choice.”

Isleifson confirmed that the bill will not apply retroactively, meaning only candidates in future municipal elections and byelections will need to make the disclosures.

With two current vacancies on the Brandon School Division’s board of trustees, the Wheat City could be one of the first jurisdictions to see the bill in action.

Reached for comment Thursday, the Association of Manitoba Municipalities pointed to a letter written by executive director Denys Volkov on May 9 in support of the legislation when it was still in the committee stage.

While Volkov wrote the organization believes in the value of municipal candidates disclosing offences as a means of improving accountability and transparency, he asked the government to provide greater clarity on how the process is supposed to work.

“To prevent possible confusion and inconsistent approaches, the AMM would encourage Manitoba Municipal Relations to develop a standardized template form for (senior election officers) to use to publish offences and clear timelines to be established that outlines when information should be posted online,” Volkov wrote.

“Moreover, the standardized form and supporting instructions should also be included in departmental guidance and training materials for municipal candidates and election officials that have been used to support the conduct and administration of previous elections.”

Isleifson said the Department of Municipal Relations will work with school boards and municipalities going forward to help those jurisdictions experiencing difficulties getting these websites set up.

The Manitoba NDP, the Manitoba Liberals, the Manitoba School Boards Association and Brandon School Division chairperson Linda Ross did not respond to a request for comment on Bill 230 on Thursday.

Another piece of legislation put forward by Isleifson, Bill 240, enshrines the right for Manitobans to wear poppies while working the week before and on Remembrance Day except when it poses a health or safety risk.

The final piece of legislation Isleifson got passed was Bill 242, which proclaims Nov. 30 as Police and Peace Officers’ Memorial Day in Manitoba going forward.

In both cases, Isleifson said the legislation was meant more to align Manitoba with other parts of the country than to correct an identified issue.

On the poppy issue, Isleifson said there was an example in another province where an employer wouldn’t allow its employees to wear them. In 2020, Whole Foods received criticism for doing so at its Canadian stores before eventually reversing the decision after public backlash.

At the federal level, a memorial day for police and peace officers has been in place since 1998 for the last Sunday in September.

“One would think ‘why didn’t we just go with the federal one,’” Isleifson said. “When we speak with the police associations, they already do a remembrance here in Manitoba so we wanted to align with them. The date actually came from them.”

He said it was fitting to have the occasion observed during the same month as Remembrance Day.

In this fall’s provincial election, Isleifson will be the only incumbent MLA in Brandon to run for re-election with his fellow Tories, Brandon West MLA Reg Helwer and Spruce Woods MLA Cliff Cullen, planning to retire.

So far, the only other candidate to be nominated in Brandon East is Glen Simard, a teacher running for the NDP. Isleifson said he would spend part of the summer ramping up his campaign.

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