EDITOR’S NOTE: This article originally appeared on The Trillium, a new Village Media website devoted to covering provincial politics at Queen’s Park.
Ontario's ombudsman says he is "encouraged" by the government's efforts to improve the accountability of school boards with a new bill, but he's asking it to go further given the numerous complaints he's received about trustees' conduct.
Last month, Education Minister Stephen Lecce introduced the Better Schools and Student Outcomes Act, which would increase provincial control over education, reform how local school boards are governed, and give the province control over excess school properties.
Of interest to Ombudsman Paul Dubé, it would also require codes of conduct for boards of trustees that can be standardized by the minister and provide for the appointment of a roster of integrity commissioners to resolve code-of-conduct complaints.
The bill is now before the social policy committee and Dubé has weighed in to commend the province for taking those steps, which he says align with advice he's given the province in the past.
"I commend Bill 98’s goal of strengthening school board oversight for the benefit of Ontario’s public education system," he wrote in a submission before the committee. "Robust codes of conduct and integrity commissioner processes play a vital role in ensuring public confidence in elected school board officials."
He prefaced his feedback by outlining some of the 280 complaints about or from trustees his office has received since 2015: using board resources for their re-election without any mechanism to stop them; failing to disclose conflicts of interest and voting on matters that affect them financially; being banned from their own school board meetings; and being verbally harassed as their board's code of conduct is weaponized against them.
Given the litany of issues, Dubé said there's more the government could be doing and proposed several further "enhancements to trustee accountability."
That includes allowing members of the public, not only trustees, to make code-of-conduct complaints about trustees, as is the case with elected municipal officials.
He'd also like to see the government expand the role of the proposed integrity commissioners to cover conflicts of interest under the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act, given the numerous complaints he's received about trustees improperly exercising influence in situations where they have a financial interest.
Dubé also recommends the legislation make it clear that his office has oversight over the new school board integrity commissioners, to deal with complaints arising from their conduct.