BackA recent column by Deb Hutton, published by Queen’s Park Briefing in January 2019, raised provocative questions about the role and usefulness of independent officers of the Legislature. Responding to an earlier column in which former Liberal minister John Milloy argued that the government was wrong to cut three of these watchdogs, Ms. Hutton, the former adviser to Premier Mike Harris, argued for even more to be eliminated.
Ontario Ombudsman Paul Dubé wrote an opinion piece on this matter, which was recently published as a guest column in Queen’s Park Briefing.
In his role as an apolitical, independent overseer of the Ontario public sector, Ombudsman Dubé explains that an important part of the Ombudsman’s job is to shine a light on things that are wrong and resolve issues before they fester and grow.
With his opinion piece Ontario Ombudsman Dubé intends to bury the misconceptions exposed by that debate, when he underlines that: “Ms. Hutton’s disturbing and erroneous suggestion that the work of independent officers can and should be done by politicians must be responded to.”
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Source: Office of the Ontario Ombudsman, Canada
