Thank you.
I want to pursue the idea of gifts as well, specifically in relation to the idea of events, receptions, information sessions, meetings, galas, whatever, the whole list of things that we all attend in the course of our jobs. I'm sure everybody in this room sitting around the table on both sides would say that those are important aspects of our job, important duties as members of Parliament, to meet with people, to hear information, to gather feedback, to meet with constituents, to speak at events, and a variety of things like that.
I'm still struggling a bit with some of the testimony and answers we had last time you were at committee in trying to determine what we can attend and what we can't, what is considered a gift and what is considered part of our official duties. I have a few questions. I hope I'll have time to get to them all.
I wonder if you could you give us some kind of clarification. When you were here last time you indicated that you were recommending that we make the code explicitly exclude events where all members have been invited. That raises a few questions for me. The first one is: how do we, as members of Parliament, know or determine what the invitation list was for an event? Were all members of Parliament invited? How are we to know?
That works well if it's an event taking place here in Ottawa or in the national capital region but it doesn't work so well when it's an event in our own constituency or in our region. If it's an event in one's own constituency is it then acceptable to attend if, say, the local municipal councillors and the local provincial elected members have been invited?
More broadly than that—I'll use Mr. Christopherson's example—if all the politicians in the Hamilton area had been invited, or in my case, if all the politicians in the Calgary area had been invited, would that make it acceptable?
It's really difficult for us to know when, where, and how to determine that. Could you give me some clarification?