Evidence of meeting #36 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was transparency.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Liberal
Abdelhaq Sari Liberal Bourassa, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you so much for being here this afternoon and for the testimony you've shared today. You have a lot of knowledge about this issue.
I will ask my question in French.
I'd like to pick up on Mr. Hardy's remarks concerning potential administrative burden.
Did you implement certain rules, legislative requirements or changes more slowly because the administrative burden could jeopardize the process?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
Thank you.
We did have a delay coming into force. Since that time, we've had other minor amendments, and there's always a period of time after the amendments are enacted until they come into force that allows for resources to be developed, staff to be put in place and education and outreach to be done.
I think that's a normal part of expanding regulatory oversight. It takes a lot of work, but I think it was well planned out and executed successfully.
Liberal
Abdelhaq Sari Liberal Bourassa, QC
I'd like to talk a little about technical details. I'm thinking about tools that were put in place, especially compliance tools. Some of the tools have penalties.
Can you give us more details about the penalties you added?
Should the federal government also introduce penalties, to make the regime more effective, achieve the desired results and encourage more ethical conduct?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
The main things we do to ensure compliance in the vast majority of cases—more than 99%—are primarily an email or a letter with some information about how the lobbyists can come into compliance, and a discussion.
The three most important tools in our tool box are a phone call, an email and a letter, and that's really it.
We do administrative monetary penalties on the basis of only the most egregious cases. We've had serious and repeated contraventions of the act.
When my investigators issue a determination, they do that on the basis of delegated authority, so that I can preserve my ability to do a reconsideration. They do that, and they examine a whole variety of aspects that may influence what an appropriate fee will be, and they do that quite transparently. That's all laid out in a determination of all the different considerations of what that fine is going to look like.
Liberal
Abdelhaq Sari Liberal Bourassa, QC
Great.
I'd like to go back to some of the questions that were raised by colleagues on both sides of the committee room. I want to talk about how you handle grassroots lobbying in British Columbia.
Do you have any lessons on that? Can you share your experience on that, so we can learn from it?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
Yes, and I apologize, because my answers on this are going to be unsatisfactory to you. It has been a policy choice of the government, at least at this point, not to recommend grassroots lobbying.
The only thing I would reference is that when thinking about grassroots lobbying, people might have different ideas about what it is. They often will attach it to stories they've heard, particularly notorious instances. Let's say they've heard an example of a grassroots lobbying initiative by an industry, and they're concerned about whether that's transparent. Also, grassroots lobbying happens on behalf of other groups as well, such as not-for-profits and so on.
My advice to the committee would be to just be expansive in examining that. I encourage value neutrality in that decision-making. Beyond that, yes, because it's not a feature of British Columbia, I don't have a whole lot of expertise to offer. I expect that the OECD folks will have something to offer on that.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Mr. Majumdar is next, for two and half minutes.
Then, Mr. Saini, you'll have two and a half minutes, sir.
Conservative
Shuv Majumdar Conservative Calgary Heritage, AB
Thank you for your testimony, Commissioner. Let me ask you something in the brief time I have.
You mentioned influence on social media by media, and we know there are forms of formal media and informal media. There are cultural media that are open to foreign exploitation as well. There are spaces in social media that span from X to WeChat.
When you look at influence operations and lobbying from those types of quarters, what do you suggest can be done to tighten the rules around transparency when lobbying like that is occurring on senior public officials and elected officials?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
It speaks to that first recommendation we made to the statutory review committee in British Columbia. I didn't reference it specifically when I commented on that earlier, but that was very much a part of the recommendation, of why we made that recommendation as well. If there are actors outside the province who are influencing lobbying inside the province, there should be transparency about that.
It's not an entirely illegitimate thing to happen that actors outside may wish to lobby. I mean, we live in a modern economy, where there may be companies outside of British Columbia that wish to operate in British Columbia, for example. It's not inherently...but when we're talking about illicit foreign interference, it's another way to shine light on what's going on. Requiring beneficial interest disclosure as part of that process gets at that. Also, the ORL participates in a collaborative multi-agency effort on this question in British Columbia.
Conservative
Shuv Majumdar Conservative Calgary Heritage, AB
Thank you.
When you think about how the media and the press present a particular perspective—an editorial view dressed up as journalism—what do you think about that type of influence in public policy debates?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
I can't comment on that. Obviously, as a citizen, I have thoughts on that, but as a registrar of lobbyists, that's not lobbying, so that's outside of my mandate to comment on.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you.
Mr. Saini, you have two and a half minutes. Please go ahead.
Liberal
Gurbux Saini Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you for coming.
Is the cooling-off period the same for the premier of the province versus a parliamentary secretary after they have completed their jobs?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
Yes. There's no scaling beyond the two years. The two-year cooling-off period applies to every former public office holder, whether it's the premier, a parliamentary secretary, an assistant deputy minister or a vice-president of a Crown corporation.
Yes, it's for two years.
Liberal
Gurbux Saini Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
The other thing you discussed was people hired as lobbyists having to declare what remuneration they will get.
Could you elaborate on that one?
Registrar, Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists for British Columbia
They should have to declare the beneficial ownership. That is our recommendation.
Organizations also have to declare funding sources or what they have received from other governments. That is currently a requirement. If there's another government funding an organization, they need to declare that. This may speak to the foreign ownership issue.
This is something that has come up in our statutory review. Lots of non-profits have said, “Hold on. I'm a non-profit that operates across the country, and I've received a grant from the Government of Alberta for this cultural programming I do. Why do I need to declare that?” Under our act, you do. Non-profits have recommended that this be addressed. We spoke sympathetically to that recommendation as well. I don't think it's of interest if someone got an arts grant from the Government of Alberta. I don't think that's the transparency people in British Columbia are interested in.
I am interested in whether the government of a foreign country is funding a company to lobby in British Columbia. I think that is something people in British Columbia want to know about or should want to know about.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you, Mr. Saini.
That concludes our first hour.
Mr. Harvey, I want to thank you for taking the time to appear before the committee. I turned to the analysts at one point and said, “He's not even been in this job for two years.” I found your knowledge very compelling, sir, and I think you added a lot of value to the testimony today. I want to thank you again on behalf of the committee.
I'm going to suspend for a couple of minutes while we switch over to our next panel. We'll be back.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
We are resuming the meeting.
The committee is resuming the statutory review of the Lobbying Act.
I'd like to welcome our witnesses for the second hour.
From the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, we have Elsa Pilichowski.
She is the director of public governance.
Also on the line, we have Nejla Saula, head of the anticorruption, integrity and open government division.
We also have Pauline Bertrand. She is a policy analyst.
Welcome to committee, everyone. We're looking forward to a valuable discussion to help us in our review of the Lobbying Act.
Elsa, I understand that you are going to provide the five-minute opening statement on behalf of your colleagues. Go ahead, please.
Elsa Pilichowski Director, Public Governance, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Honourable members of the committee, obviously, it's a pleasure to appear before you today to contribute to your review of Canada's Lobbying Act.
As you mentioned, Mr. Chair, I am joined today by Ms. Nejla Saula, head of the OECD's anti-corruption, integrity and open government division, which is responsible for all aspects of lobbying at the OECD, and by Ms. Pauline Bertrand, from the same division, who leads our work on transparency and integrity in relation to lobbying and influence. I'll make a few remarks for context, and my colleagues will answer any of the more technical questions.
I'll start with a few words on the OECD's work in this area. Our work is based on the OECD recommendation on transparency and integrity in lobbying and influence, which was first adopted in 2010 and updated in 2024. The update was quite comprehensive.
An OECD recommendation is a legal instrument, and in this case, a non-binding one, adopted by the OECD council, and thus by the 38 OECD member countries. It sets out agreed-upon principles and standards for public policy to guide countries.
This specific recommendation is now a leading reference and helps public authorities optimize the benefits of lobbying while mitigating the risks of undue or disproportionate influence. This is the first international instrument to take a comprehensive view of the influence ecosystem. It covers all stakeholders engaged in lobbying as well as a whole range of influence tools, from direct representation of interests to communication campaigns and influence exerted on behalf of interests linked to foreign states.
The recent review of the recommendation sought to address the increasingly digital, complex and interconnected nature of influence ecosystems as well as the need to adapt regulatory frameworks accordingly. Today is therefore a particularly timely opportunity to engage in this discussion regarding potential ways to strengthen Canada's Lobbying Act.
Our data show that lobbying remains one of the least regulated areas of public integrity across the OECD. Within this broader context, Canada stands out as having one of the most robust frameworks.
According to the 2025 public integrity indicators that the OECD publishes, Canada is among the strongest performers, in both the strength of its legal framework and its implementation. According to our data, it is fulfilling 80% of the criteria for lobbying regulations and 89% for practice, which are well above the OECD averages of 43% and 38% respectively.
It's also important to note that these indicators focus on the core building blocks of the lobbying framework. As such, while Canada performs strongly on these foundational elements, there remains scope for improvement in more detailed and technical aspects of the regime. In this regard, there is a growing body of international good practices from which Canada can draw inspiration.
Our latest data show that, as of 2025, 61% of OECD countries formally define lobbying in their regulatory frameworks. This progress is particularly striking when viewed in a historical perspective, because 15 years ago, only five OECD countries, including Canada, had formal lobbying regulations in place.
To conclude, I would emphasize that the growing number of integrity rules and reporting requirements is sometimes perceived as a constraint on effective governance. Lobbying regulations may be viewed as burdensome by some who are subject to disclosure obligations. Some public officials may feel that such rules limit their ability to engage freely with stakeholders.
That being said, experience across OECD countries consistently shows that well-designed lobbying frameworks strike a balance between transparency and proportionate compliance. They provide clarity for stakeholders, strengthen accountability and ultimately support better public policy-making, leading to more effective, fair and trusted outcomes.
This is particularly relevant in the Canadian context. According to the OECD 2024 survey on the drivers of trust in public institutions, 49% of respondents in Canada still believe their government would accept corporate lobbying that favours industry interests over those of society, compared to 43% at the OECD level. These are perception data, but perception data are also facts. They are factual perception data.
When nearly half of citizens question their government's resilience to undue influence, even if it is only a perception, this is not a marginal concern. It's a clear call to action.
We are very happy to discuss this further with the committee and to provide any information or comparative insights that may support your study.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. We welcome any questions you may have.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you, Ms. Pilichowski.
We're going to start with our six-minute rounds. I'm going to ask members if they can direct their questions to one of the three specific individuals. That would make it easier. If it's to all three, clearly indicate that.
We're going to start with Mr. Majumdar. He is from the Conservative Party of Canada. He's going to start with six minutes.
Go ahead, Mr. Majumdar.