Watchdog will be more active, open: Tory

The new Progressive Conservative deputy chair of a long-dormant legislative committee is promising a higher work rate and at least some public meetings.

"Youll see a very active public accounts committee," Conception Bay EastBell Island MHA David Brazil said. "Weve met and weve already all come to that consensus. Well move the process through over the near future."

AsCBC News reported in February, the PAC which is supposed to examine government spending has lapsed into dormancy in recent years.

Beforereconvening last week, the committee held only one private meeting in the previous 18 months.

The PAC has not met in public in six years.

Brazil says that will changeat least some work will be done in public.

"We will assess what are the needs there, and what issues we have to tackle," he said during Fridays broadcast of CBC's On Point Radio.

'Youll see a very active public accounts committee. Weve met and weve already all come to that consensus.' Tory MHA and PAC vice-chair David Brazil

"There will be some that are in-house, and there will be some that will be public."

Former Liberal MHA Roland Butler, who chaired the committee before retiring last year, said the majority of Tories on the PAC stymied previous attempts to do work in public.

Public meetings are standard practice in other jurisdictions.

New Brunswick held 18 public PAC meetings last year; Nova Scotia had 25 in 2010.

Recommendations ignored

The dearth of recent activity in Newfoundland and Labrador flies in the face of recommendations in the Green Report.

Five years ago, Chief Justice Derek Green issued a series of recommendations in the wake of the house of assembly spending scandal.

A more active PAC was one of them.

Green wrote he was "convinced" that an effective PAC could play "an important oversight role in relation to the financial affairs of the legislature."

At the time, he noted that the PAC was "virtually moribund."

Opposition support

MHAs from both opposition parties say they support the committee doing its work in public.

Liberal Andrew Parsons says the new chair of the committee, St. Barbe MHA Jim Bennett, will press to make the PAC more active, and transparent.

"Everything that goes on should be as public as possible," Parsons said. "Why not? Why hide it?"

For the first time, the New Democrats will have representation on the committeeStraits-White Bay North MHA Christopher Mitchelmore.

NDP MHA Dale Kirby says his party is also onside.

"Its odd that the public accounts committee would be holding its meetings in secret," Kirby said.