Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Madam Shepherd, for coming. It was very interesting and very timely.
I think the issue with lobbying that is very important to us is to ensure.... We're talking about open access to government, efficiency, and making sure the people who represent various organizations or companies are able to meet and provide input on the development of government policies. That's something we don't want to limit.
Our concern is the fly-by-nighters—the people who break the rules, the people who decide to fly under the radar. We have a number of concerns about your inability to actually hold these people to account. In 23 years, nobody has been prosecuted for improperly lobbying. Over 30 have been let off the hook since 2004 for unregistered lobbying. It seems your hands are unfairly tied in terms of weeding these people out and holding them to account in any substantive way.
Given yesterday's report on Mr. Jaffer and Mr. Glémaud, it seems that a financial penalty may be one of the only ways of actually getting characters like this to abide by the law. Do you feel that if we have that administrative monetary penalty it may alleviate some of this below-the-radar lobbying?