The Trudeau government’s reluctance to follow the lead of lawmakers in the United States and Australia in banning sexual relationships between legislators and their staffers is understandable. Such a ban, as many experts have pointed out, would rest on uncertain legal grounds, and in any case would be almost impossible to enforce, encouraging secrecy and undermining trust in the workplace.

But while a ban may be untenable, the government’s apparent disinclination to adopt other basic modern HR practices casts doubt on its stated commitment, especially in this #MeToo moment, to create a safer and more professional Parliament Hill.

Asked by the Globe and Mail on Sunday whether, as part of her crackdown on sexual misconduct in the federal workplace, Labour Minister Patty Hajdu would require disclosure of relationships between lawmakers and their staffers, the minister dodged the question.

But the answer should be obvious. Requiring disclosure is standard practice in private companies – and for good reason. It allows for organizations to guard against abuses of power and to ensure that the inevitable complications of such relationships – appearances of favouritism, for instance – are mitigated and managed.

Hajdu says Bill C-65, the new rules to protect federal employees from workplace sexual harassment, is not meant to cover consensual relationships. But as the #MeToo movement has clearly demonstrated, the question of consent becomes blurry in workplace relationships between people with different levels of power.

In the case of political offices, where power differentials are particularly exaggerated and a culture of partisanship compounds the challenges, this sort of accountability mechanism should be welcomed. The Trudeau government should commit, whether through legislation or regulation, to require disclosure. Surely our leaders should be held to at least as a high a standard as the rest of us.

The government should also commit to creating an independent office to handle claims of sexual misconduct, though on this, too, the labour minister has hedged. Under the current system, staffers are encouraged to complain first to their MP or to their party. But the obvious incentives for party insiders to sweep such allegations under the rug are not conducive to fair process. That’s why both the U.S. Congress and the United Kingdom have recently appointed independent advisers to handle such claims.

The current complaint process is very clearly broken. Upon unveiling the new legislation, Hajdu described a longstanding “whisper network” among political staffers who warn one another about lecherous MPs and other figures to avoid. In a recent Canadian Press survey of female MPs, some 60 per cent of respondents said they had been sexually harassed at some point on the job. It’s hard to imagine that the problem is not at least as bad for staffers, who are less powerful and often younger.

Yet rarely before the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the movement that has followed did we see these bad actors exposed or held to account. Either victims weren’t coming forward or the system was not serving them well or both. Regardless, an independent office is an important part of the solution.

The cross-partisan support for stronger federal protections against workplace sexual harassment, including for Hill staffers, has sent an encouraging signal that in this moment of needed upheaval, legislators understand that they must lead by example.

But signals without substance can do more harm than good. The government should either tweak Bill C-65 to include these essential accountability mechanisms or commit to introducing regulations that would achieve the same result. The professionalization of Parliament Hill and ensuring a safe workplace require HR practices that give greater priority to the welfare of workers than to the political fortunes of the parties that employ them.