This regulation was put in place and essentially said that under the Lobbying Act everyone is a public office holder now. That meant that everyone has the five-year ban applying to them.
It was the only way the government could really act without having to introduce a bill and go through a delayed process to try to correct a situation and get more communication disclosure of lobbyists lobbying anybody. That was really the aim of that change, but what it did indirectly was extend the cooling-off period of five years to everyone.
It doesn't make sense. If you're a backbench MP who is not on any committee, then you and your staff should have the shortest length of time. If you're on a committee, then you'd have a slightly longer period of time from the issues you deal with on that committee. If you're a liaison to a minister or a parliamentary secretary, it would be slightly more, for a minister of state, slightly more than that, for a minister, more, and the same with staff within each of those offices. A range of one to five years is what we're recommending.
It would be set out in the act. Essentially you would go to the commissioner when you're leaving and the commissioner would say, “Okay, you were on this committee three years ago, so you're already three years into your cooling-off period on those issues.” You would essentially get some instructions from her about how long you have to sit out on various issues, depending on what you had done in your time in office and when you had done it.