Senator Grafstein:

Ms. Shepherd, welcome to the Senate.

I was interested in the difference between lobbying where the office-holder receives information or is lobbied, versus when a designated officer, in effect, seeks information that may benefit the designated person that the minister or the designated officer reaches out to. I will give a specific example.

Let us assume that the Minister of Finance receives a designated lobby from an association dealing with issues affecting their industry, or the minister decides to call that lobbyist and seek their advice. Are both of them caught by this act?

Ms. Shepherd: There are two parts to that question. In terms of an initial registration, communicating with a public office-holder to amend legislation or a regulation — basically, changing the state of play — is captured by the act because it is communicating with a public office-holder; it would be a registerable activity in terms of determining whether an initial registration is filed.

To answer your question, communication with a designated public office-holder such as the Minister of Finance would be a registerable activity.

With the new requirement of monthly reporting, if the individual lobbied the Minister of Finance to request a meeting and the meeting was oral and arranged and had to do with trying to change the state of play or, as you said, the bill or legislation going forward, that would have to be reported monthly. If the Minister of Finance was to call and ask the individual to come in and comment on the legislation or the proposal, it would be covered in the initial registration, as I indicated. However, there would be no requirement to report it monthly, unless it was about a financial benefit. In that case, it would not matter who initiated the call or the meeting.

Senator Grafstein: If a labour leader, a farm leader or a leader of a banking association contacts a minister, either at their request or at the minister's request, that lobby has to be filed; is that correct?

Ms. Shepherd: It would be considered a registerable activity. There are different rules for consultant lobbyists and for in-house organizations or corporations. That particular activity or meeting would need to be factored into whether the organization or the corporation needs to register.

There is a threshold which would trigger in terms of hitting a significant amount of one person's time. Therefore, that would become a registerable activity and would need to be looked at in terms of whether a registration is required.

Senator Grafstein: I wish to be clear. This should obviously be a warning to anyone who deals with any public office-holder: If a minister — again, the Minister of Finance — decides it has become a practice before a budget to go and seek the views of the stakeholders who will be affected by the budget before he concludes what the budget should be, that is a lobby and must be filed. Am I clear on that?

Ms. Shepherd: I want to make sure I am clear of the question as well.

Senator Grafstein: Every Minister of Finance in the last decade or so has been actively sought stakeholders' advice about what form the budget should take, which is all private and confidential until the budget is announced. The minister, pursuant to his duties, goes out and elicits opinions from these various stakeholders: the unions, pension boards, banks, financial institutions, labour unions, farmers, et cetera. He seeks their opinions and views.

In the course of that exchange, they tell him their views. They say, "We do not want you affect our industry or our farming communities. We do not want you to affect our unions. We do not want you to affect our pensions." It is a grassroots exchange.

From those exchanges, the minister, in effect, tables a budget. Is all that activity now covered by this legislation?

Ms. Shepherd: It was always covered by the legislation if it was "communicating" to change the state of play. However, a number of factors also affect it in terms of whether the individual is actually paid. If you are talking to most of the associations, the individuals are paid to communicate on those activities.

If the activities are public forums, there is an interpretation bulletin and exemption in the act that talks about communicating. If the activity is already public, it needs to be registered.

However, in terms of looking at when the minister goes out and talks, there are a number of factors that need to be determined as to whether that registration is required. For example, if the minister goes out and talks to the farmer, you would look at whether the farmer is paid.

The activity, as you have described it, is probably a registerable activity because it looks like it is changing the state of play or having an impact. The next factor, if it is for an in-house organization or corporation, is whether — taking that activity that is now registerable — it adds up to a significant amount of time that triggers the organization or the corporation having to register.

Senator Grafstein: To be continued; thank you.

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