Evidence of meeting #41 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 registry.
A video is available from Parliament.
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
I don't think I'm qualified to make that determination.
I can talk only about the lobbyist registry and how that is working, and I can tell you that I can rely only on receiving allegations or hearing of or seeing anything. If I do, I'll look into it, and if there's a breach of the Lobbying Act, then I will investigate and I will forward it to the RCMP, but I don't know about the foreign registry. It's not my—
Conservative
Vincent Ho Conservative Richmond Hill South, ON
Could the Lobbying Act, in its current state, be amended to sort of broaden the scope of what could be captured so that it could help you identify more of these cases?
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
I don't know if it would require a broadening of the act, because it covers quite a bit already. Certainly, if I am to be turning every single rock, you will have to triple or quadruple my office. That's what would have to happen.
Liberal
Amandeep Sodhi Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Commissioner, for coming before the committee today.
It's my first time in ethics. I'm excited to be here.
The Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying is requesting approximately $5.46 million in voted expenditures for 2026-27. The departmental plan also identifies “depth of capacity” as a key organizational risk for the office as a micro-organization.
How is the office ensuring that it can continue to fulfill its compliance, investigative and transparency mandate while operating with relatively stable funding and limited organizational capacity?
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
That's a very, very good question.
I will tell you it's because of the quality of the staff that I have. I am going to become emotional. I manage a team of 35 who really believe in the mandate, who go above and beyond.
Very often we can't be innovative and we can't be proactive. We're often reactive, because the demand is high.
However, I have a very small team. I have one person who does everything. There is no depth of capacity. We're 35 employees with the exact same obligations as every other department out there, plus our mandate. We work extremely hard, but we love what we do. We believe in what we do. We have fun doing it, which is probably why we were ranked first.
I think the only answer to that is to have the right people in the right jobs. They're all very collaborative and helpful. When someone is away, someone else picks it up. It's a wonderful team.
Liberal
Amandeep Sodhi Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
That's good. I'm really glad to hear that.
I think all of us can relate to the idea of having a team that works together collaboratively. One of my staff members is here, and I don't know what would happen if she wasn't here one day on the Hill. It's the team that holds you together, so I completely understand your being emotional about it.
I just want to go into a bit about artificial intelligence and oversight. The departmental plan notes that the office will consider integrating artificial intelligence features into future registry updates.
Are you able to tell us how AI tools could improve administrative efficiency and compliance oversight while still maintaining fairness, accountability and public trust in the lobbying framework?
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
It would require great care and a lot of money.
With a team of 35 right now, I can tell you we're not the most advanced in AI. I'm waiting to see where things will go. My staff have all been trained. They know to use Copilot very, very carefully, with no personal information, etc. We've all been trained.
AI could be used. I'm thinking if ever the registry is updated, if some of the recommendations come in, there are ways to possibly recognize the quality of entries through AI that would have been programmed and planned, but I can't anticipate right now that AI could replace people when it comes to the registry. My head just doesn't go there, personally.
If we were to verify what could be done, it would require quite a bit of investment, and we don't have that money to look at it. We'll see what the future holds on that.
Liberal
Amandeep Sodhi Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
I will ask just a bit about accessibility and procurement priorities. I understand that your accessibility plan from 2026 to 2028, under the Treasury Board directive on the management of procurement, required continued investments in accessibility and indigenous procurement initiatives.
How is the office balancing these government-wide commitments alongside its core regulatory and oversight responsibilities within its current budget framework?
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
Again, we do it. We do it carefully. We know our obligations. We know when they come up.
On accessibility, one of the departments actually reviewed our website and our registry. It gave us some suggestions, and we did them.
In regard to indigenous procurement, we have less than 600,000 dollars' worth of contracts. This year, I think we will be at 12%, so we'll meet the 5% target. We always try to have indigenous contracting. We meet our obligations. We know what we have to do, but I will never jeopardize the core mandate for the purposes of meeting corporate government obligations. So far, we've been able to do both, but it's difficult. It's demanding, but we do it.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Linda Lapointe
Thank you very much.
Ms. Gaudreau, you have two and a half minutes.
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
It saddens me when we talk about a foreign agent registry. I've had 70 meetings on foreign interference, particularly by the Chinese. I think that if we want to walk the talk, we have to take action.
Ms. Bélanger, I have a question for you. If there were more prevention in your work, and with all the resources we would provide you, would we today be analyzing the lobbying compliance for 19 files, in your opinion?
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
I'm not sure I understand your question. If we did more prevention—
Bloc
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
If you investigated, if you were in a proactive mode—
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
On the contrary, I would say that we are very proactive.
The compliance team is made up of six people. This year, we made 196 presentations. We reached over 2,000 individuals. We do a lot of outreach.
We've updated our website. We're on LinkedIn. We're really trying to be proactive. Again, I have a two-person team that does that. I've given over 30 presentations in the last six months. We go to great lengths. We could do more if we had more people and more resources.
Commissioner of Lobbying, Office of the Commissioner of Lobbying
If we were to impose more penalties, I might not have 2,000 late files. I believe that transparency delayed is no transparency at all.
If the first two or three people who had registered late had been fined, maybe there would have been fewer than 2,000 late files. Fines would serve as prevention.
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
I'll ask you my last question.
I understand that you may be concerned about the digital rollout with artificial intelligence. I'm sure you are aware that there is a brand-new joint investigation in which four privacy commissioners took part. My questions in the next round are going to focus on OpenAI and ChatGPT.
You also know that there is a new platform on the horizon. I found out this morning. It's CANChat. Have you heard of CANChat?
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
It's an AI chatbot for the federal public service.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Linda Lapointe
Thank you, Ms. Gaudreau.
Next, we'll go to Mr. Gourde for five minutes.
Conservative
Jacques Gourde Conservative Lévis—Lotbinière, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you for being here, Ms. Bélanger. We have known each other for a long time, since 2007.
When I was in the former government, parliamentary secretaries, ministers and the Prime Minister also inherited the title of public office holder. We had more extensive obligations than those of a member of Parliament with respect to lobbyists who met with us. We had to pay special attention to it.
Sometimes, even when we weren't taking part in official meetings, people approached us and talked to us about certain programs or government business. We were all in a pretty sensitive area. Sometimes we had to step back or ask if people were lobbyists or not. It's not exactly written on their foreheads that they're lobbyists. When they come to our offices and we ask them in, we think they are registered. We can ask them if they are registered or assume they are.
Is that still the case today? Do members also have more obligations than they did before 2015?