The answer is yes. The first thing is to start with one act. You pick one, whether it's the Lobbying Act or the Conflict of Interest Act, and then you go from there. Then you take the existing menus of the various post-employment guidelines and, as parliamentarians, you ultimately decide what will apply to yourselves and what should apply to everyone else who works in the federal public service.
I think this committee will agree that if you are in a senior ranking position in a ministry, you're going to have a different standard in terms of the impact you will make on a decision than you will if you're further down the pole in that same department. I think the original post-employment guidelines that were administered under the Conflict of Interest Act recognized that difference.
What we're saying is that creating a third sliding scale as it relates to designated public office holders under the Lobbying Act confounds that problem and also acts as a barrier to post-employment for the individuals as they are promoted through the public service. I think one area that hasn't gotten a lot of study, both by the public service and by Parliament, is the impact that the lobbying rules have had on individuals as they proceed through the public service. There are probably people who have made a very difficult decision to take that next step and move up in the public service ranks knowing that the impact will affect them after they leave the public service.