Nunavut ethics officer upholds one of 11 complaints made in 2015

Nunavut’s ethics officer Jeffrey Schnoor: his first annual report, from 2015-16, documents 11 complaints of wronging doing within Nunavut’s public service but says only one actually amounted to wrongdoing. (FILE PHOTO)

Nunavut’s ethics officer received 11 disclosures from Government of Nunavut public servants in his first full year of operating in the territory.

But Winnipeg’s Jeffrey Schnoor, appointed as Nunavut’s ethics officer in January 2015 for a five-year term, determined that only one case amounted to wrongdoing.

Schnoor tabled his first annual report to the Nunavut legislature June 1.

“Confidence in the fair, efficient and ethical operation of the public service is essential for all who work within it and for all Nunavummiut,” Schnoor wrote in the report.

“I am pleased to be able to contribute to building that confidence.”

Of those 11 disclosures from GN staff, five were considered not wrongdoing, one investigation was suspended, one investigation is on-going, one was referred to another authority, and in one instance, he declined to investigate.

In the one case where a complaint was upheld, Schnoor described it as sexual harassment over a period of seven years involving leering, wolf-whistles, “and, on at least one occasion, inappropriate touching,” he wrote.

Considering how long it went on, the perpetrator’s repeated denials and lack of remorse, despite witness accounts corroborating the complainant’s story, he recommended that:

• the perpetrator be dismissed;

• the GN pay the complainant $3,000 in compensation;

• the GN take steps to make sure managers understand their obligations to respond proactively to sexual harassment complaints; and,

• the GN take steps to ensure that all employees understand that they can and should complain about sexual harassment in the workplace.

The five complaints in which Schnoor found no wrongdoing involved three allegations of harassment or bullying, one of sharing confidential information and harassment and one of contract favouritism or bias.

The 11 disclosures came from seven different government departments: health (3), environment (3), education (3), family services (2), finance (1), economic development and transportation (1), and justice (1).

The ethics officer’s annual report for 2015-16 was one of several human resources documents discussed in the legislature’s committee of the whole last week as part of an examination into how the GN has managed workplace wellness since the standalone 2013 dissolution of the human resources department.