Madam Chair, through you, I want to thank the honourable member for the question.
I think this gets to the heart of your job as members of Parliament, because what that change does on the heels of classifying you as DPOHs and bringing you under the act, which is underwritten by the Criminal Code, no small thing, is.... It used to be that the lobbyist initiated the contact. This changes it so that, if you initiate the contact, then it could be registerable.
Let's say you decide that there's an issue in your riding. You want to go and consult with a local company that may or may not be having a problem. The person in the room might be registered to lobby, and you start talking about something the government may or may not do. This is part of your job.
You may very well find that on a website, because that person has to disclose it, even though you initiated the contact. I think members of Parliament need to give that some thought. Are you going to hand away that chunk of your parliamentary privilege, and for what reason? It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense to me. I would just caution members that, if you're going to go down that particular road, leave the initiation to the lobbyist. They're the ones who come under the act. They're the ones who are going to pay the price if they get it wrong.
By changing that one stipulation, you are essentially opening a back door to what you as MPs do, which has historically been private activities in the wake of doing your job and your constitutional right to do your job without interference or hindrance as a core parliamentary privilege principle. I think that it bumps up against it, and it certainly needs more discussion than we can give it here today.