Who watches the watchmen, Mr. Coiteux?
I noticed the following on Twitter yesterday afternoon:
Now there’s nothing wrong with Martin Coiteux enjoying the Montreal Grand Prix, I just found it slightly inappropriate that he would be using his public Twitter account to do so:
Then I was quickly reminded that Mr. Coiteux actually holds two offices in the Liberal cabinet:
There’s nothing illegal about dual mandates. However there is something that smells entirely inappropriate about the Minister of Municipal Affairs also being the Minister of Public Safety.
Depending on who you believe, the economic impact of the Montreal Grand Prix is estimated at anywhere between $42M to $89M. With all that cash coming to town, you wouldn’t say, want to admit you might have a problem with prostitution and human trafficking, in fact, to keep everyone happy, you might even wish to turn a blind-eye to the problem, as evidenced by the following in last week’s Gazette:
Experts say major international sporting events, such as the World Cup and the Olympics, raise the demands for young, female prostitutes.
Montreal’s annual high-octane extravaganza is no exception, but many of the sex workers who are used to fill the commercial void are unwilling participants, human rights activists say.
The article goes on to say that enforcement fn the sex-tourism trade in Canada has been “slack”:
(UBC law professor Benjamin Perrin) also said Canada has lagged when it comes to rounding up sex tourists, who travel abroad abusing children. Perrin said sex tourism drives human trafficking around the world.
Canada, meanwhile, has convicted only one person in the past decade on sex-tourism charges, he said.
“We’ve really fallen behind globally in preventing our child-sex offenders from exploiting children in impoverished countries overseas,” said Perrin, the founder of The Future Group, a non-governmental organization dedicated to ending human trafficking.
The same is true for police forces. A Public Safety Minister who is also a Municipal Affairs Minister wouldn’t want to look to closely at the Montreal police who appear to be spiraling out of control, that could hurt tourism:
Montreal police chief stays coy about probe into ethical breaches
And just think of the negative economic impacts of admitting sexual predators and – here I’ll say it – serial killers have been preying on the province for decades?
You can’t serve two interests, M. Coiteux. It may not be illegal, but it is certainly inappropriate and unethical.