Integrity in train – IPO seminar sensitizes
By Bennette Roach
Seminar to inform
Throughout the past year TMR has been addressing and discussing among others such matters as Integrity. This week a very well qualified Julian N. Johnson from the neighbouring OECS country of Dominica, over May 28 -29, conducted on behalf of the Montserrat Integrity Commission, a training seminar on the Integrity In Public Office Act 2010, (IPO Act), which was passed in Parliament on January 22, 2010, assented by the Governor on February 9, 2010 and published in the Official Gazette.
The Act under which the Commission was eventually established, after several attempts since 2010 on January 29, this year (2014) provides for the establishment of an Integrity Commission for the purpose of receiving declarations of the financial affairs of persons holding specific positions in public life, for the purpose of establishing probity, integrity and accountability in public life and related matters.
Senior Public Servants, Directors, Assistant Secretaries, Heads of Departments, etc…
The members or Commissioners are James Hixon, Chairman and Rev Dr. Ruth Allen and an accountant, Mrs. Theresa Silcott. (At least one member of the Commission shall be an attorney-at-law or a chartered accountant either or both of whom possess at least fifteen years’ standing.)
The workshop intended to educate, discuss with and sensitize Persons in attendance respecting Persons in Public Life (PIPL) as described in the First Schedule of the Act, their responsibilities under Section 14 of the Act in the filing of declarations. the functions of the Commission. These are outlined in Section 9 of the Act, which states that the Commission shall:
(a) receive, examine and retain all declarations filed with it under this Act;
(b)make such inquiries as it considers necessary in order to verify or determine the accuracy of any declarations filed under this act;
(c) without prejudice to the provisions of any other enactment, inquire into any allegation of bribery or act of corruption under this Act;
(d) receive and investigate complaints regarding non- compliance with any provision of this Act; and
(e) perform such other functions as are required under this Act.
The first schedule describes these persons as:
Adviser or Assistant to the Chief Minister and other Ministers; Chair of the Board of a public institution however styled; Chief Executive Officer of a public institution however styled; Chief Technical Officer (as described in Part 1 of the Act); Deputy Governor; Gazetted Police Officer
Member of the Legislative Council; and Speaker of the Legislative (Council).
Chief Technical Officer according to the Act refers to and includes: any Director or head of department or deputy head of department however described in a Government Ministry or Department.
Inset: Mr. Julian N. Johnson experienced
Legislative Council is now Legislative Assembly.
There is also the circumstance where, not in every situation, the Attorney General is the Director of Public Prosecution.
The Commissioners received training in their tasks in Dominica where it is being promoted that their Integrity legislation is quite similar to Montserrat’s. The training took place between February, 2014, very shortly after their installation in January.
The Commission then sought to advise and inform attendees to the seminar that failure to comply has severe penalties and the Act does not allow the Commission to give any leniency but to publish the fact in the Official Gazette and send names of persons to the Attorney General for further action with regards to Section 22 of the Act. “Hence the Commission is seeking your co- operation so as to establish a 100% compliance.”
It stressed and noted that the Commission operates and guarantees, “Secrecy and Confidentiality”, the fact that the declarations filed with the Commission are secret and confidential, Section of 20 of the Act sets out clearly how the information should be treated.
Two of three members of the integrity Commission with seminar facilitator
On the back of that the Commission also sought to, “… assure, that provisions are in place to secure the documents and Section 21 sets out the penalty for every member and every person performing in the service of the Commission for the disclosure of information to unauthorized persons.”
Mr. Julian N. Johnson, a Barrister-at-law, his forty years’ experience in public service spans a spectrum of diplomacy (attending with Prime Ministers and Ministers at regional and international meetings and conferences in the major bilateral and multilateral fora) public management, teaching and human resource development, consumer protection supplies control and disaster management, legal consultancy and research in constitutional and administrative law, including the jurisdiction and functions of the major oversight institutions of the Constitution.
The Vision Statement of the Commission is: “A nation free of corruption and governed by persons in public life who are imbued with the highest standard of integrity. “
