Debates of April 25th, 1995

Lobbyists Registration Act

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

Mr. Speaker, may I then ask for unanimous consent to have a few more minutes?

[The Deputy Speaker]

How much longer does the member require?

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

Five minutes.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Is there unanimous consent?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I love this good sense of negotiating here.

[An hon. member]

Lobbying.

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

This was clear negotiation. No lobbying was involved here.

One of the things we need to do is to make sure that there is no means of hiding the lobbying process.

Right now what we are doing with the intent of this bill-the Lobbyists Registration Act started it, this bill amends it and its intent is to strengthen it. It is recognizing the reality of lobbying in our present system.

As I have said, if we are going to have it, we need to be totally open. We need to make sure that the people of the country understand this. What we want is for the rules for lobbyists to all be the same.

Presently the bill does not require the disclosure of who is lobbied. Therefore I come to another very important point. One of the amendments in this group-and I do not remember the exact number, perhaps it is Motion No. 17-indicates what we want to include in the registration of the lobbying process. It is not only which government department is being lobbied. That is what is being called for now. We also want to have specific individuals.

Again, how general is this going to become? We need to recognize that just because a person makes a phone call, that is not lobbying. A person who talks to someone to ask who is in charge of a department, is not lobbying.

We must go back again to the definition which says if you are influencing or attempting to influence government and you are being paid for it, that is the definition of a lobbyist. If that is occurring, then the people of Canada should know not only who the lobbyist is on this side but also who the government official is on the other side.

What is there to hide? Why should we hesitate for a moment to say who the deputy minister was in the meeting to present the information? Why should we hide that? There is absolutely no reason. Again, the more information we can get to the people, the greater their trust will be in the whole process.

Another one is, how much money passes the hands? Obviously this is a matter of great importance. In talking to my constituents I have found that they are very concerned about the total costs to run an MP's office. For example, there has been a lot of interest in my constituency about the fact that the average MP gets an additional present value of around $2,500 a month in order to provide for his pension benefits. They are interested in those things.

Our question is, how much is being paid to lobbyists? People should know this. If it is a small amount, probably there is no big deal but if we are dealing with millions of dollars, that should raise a flag. People should know that.

I would like to quote someone: "I think fees and major disbursements should be registered". Later in the same session, the same person said: "What is wrong with a system that would disclose fees and major disbursements? After all, if the whole business of having a registration system is to identify who is doing what to whom so that the competing interest has a right to

know, how do we know who is doing what to whom unless there is a price tag, unless there is a caveat at the end? At what cost?"

I am quoting the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell who, when he sat on this side of the House, said that we need to disclose these things. We need to make sure that the people know not only who is doing what but at what price. This is a very important aspect of the bill.

I would also like to read another quote: "One of the reasons I believe we must reform the act to declare lobbyists' fees is because at times"-and then he interrupted himself and said: "Just take the referendum. Millions of dollars were put through the system by lobbying firms advocating a particular point of view and very little of that was known". That too was spoken by a member of the Liberal Party, the hon. member for Broadview-Greenwood.

Obviously, I am speaking of things that members on that side of the House agreed with when they were on this side. So let us stay with our principles and let us support these amendments.

I appreciate the additional time, Mr. Speaker.

[Ted McWhinney, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to intervene in this debate. It gives me the opportunity, not having been a member of the committee or the subcommittee charged with the matters before the House today, to look back on earlier professional work in another capacity.

Clearly this has been an excellent committee and a really outstanding subcommittee. This is a thoughtful, well-reasoned report. It reflects great credit on members from all parties who did the necessary research which led up to the conclusions. It says a great deal for the capacity of Parliament to evolve as a living institution and about the sort of new responsibilities that committees are being encouraged to take on. My compliments to the committee, to the subcommittee, its chair and its members for the work they have done.

I believe the debate to date has been helpful, constructive and useful. Members of the opposition will pardon me if I make some suggestions on the preliminary definitional question.

The life of the law, as Mr. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes reminded us, has not been logic, it has been experience. It is an error and perhaps the labours of Sisyphus, an eternal task that never reaches a conclusion, to attempt an a priori definition of lobbying.

I think it is best, as the bill provides, to try to reach an operational definition, a definition in logical extensity, and to say what types of activities are to be subject to disclosure or registration, rather than to attempt an abstract definition in advance. It will be, in the end, up to the courts-the courts in the regular sense, the judicial sense, and the court in the original constitutional sense, the high court of Parliament-to decide what is permissible and impermissible lobbying activity. Again, the effort to define in an abstract way is perhaps better redirected to spelling out in more detail the sort of activities one wants to cover.

When I was first a student of constitutional law, lobbying was viewed as evil per se, a reprehensible, nefarious activity. The attitudes changed, however, with increasing sophistication as to what the legislative processes are about and what parliamentary decisions in contemporary democratic societies amount to. That is to say that one is balancing competing social interests.

To do that job effectively one must identify those competing social interests. One must attempt some sort of quantification of the social value of those interests and that requires a detailed empirical record. One must then attempt to establish some sort of hierarchy of importance of the interests before leading to an intelligent, rational decision. The philosopher would tell you this is William James' conception of pragmatism, the pragmatic conception of truth. In constitutional law terms it is simply Roscoe Pound's sociological jurisprudence, the balancing of interests which is at the core of any rational judicial decision making today but not less of decisions within Parliament itself.

The United States pioneered legislation on lobbying many years ago. Its emphasis is on disclosure: the bringing out into the open of particular interest groups involved in any piece of legislation and trying to assess what the interest groups represent. Are the interests they represent substantial as distinct from merely vocal? Does the vocality or the degree of force with which they are expressed balance their representativeness in social terms and their claim to validity in the economic or other terms in which they are being debated? Therefore the emphasis on disclosure is the key element.

Every member of Parliament who does his or her job is subject to lobbying by various interest groups in the constituency or in the general region. Nothing is wrong with that. It really depends on the degree of control of the office and the degree of energy the member brings to putting the interest groups in proper perspective.

When companies or trade unions wish to meet with me I welcome them. If it is a company I want to read the balance sheet, the annual report. I want to meet with the officers. If it is important enough I want to visit the plant. I want to see potential competitors. All of us do this. We recognize the value involved and the good faith and integrity with which people approach this.

The only thing objectionable is covert lobbying, the covert exercise of pressure. I do not think for most of us this is what is involved.

Reference was made to the Pearson airport issue. I would have thought that was less an example of lobbying than an example of the public contracting process and how not to operate it. Very clearly one thing is that in the lame duck period of any government, as the concept has emerged in the United States, public contracting of a high level of community involvement should be avoided at all costs or exercised with extreme discretion.

I do not think it is an example of lobbying gone wrong. It is rather an example of the need to exercise extra control over public contracting when a government effectively has lost its mandate.

Putting it in proper perspective, the bill recognizes the reality that interest groups will bring forward their particular cause to parliamentarians; two, that they are entitled to do so; and three, provided they bring forward proper information, properly researched, and that members themselves exercise the necessary care of reading those reports, trying to make assessments, seeking further information from other independent sources before making any decision, it is a valid and necessary part of the gathering of information in aid of legislation.

Intelligent legislation demands that interest groups bring forward their claims and their causes. In that sense the committee has met the challenge and brought forward a thoughtful law that takes us a good deal along the way to solution of any problems that in the public domain might have been thought to exist.

As I have said, I have no problem with professional interest groups, with companies, with trade unions, with other groups that come to me. I have more problems with umbrella organizations that claim to represent whole segments of society. These are the hardest ones to catch in the scope of legislation such as this because their operation in the political processes comes not through this reasoned process of bringing information in aid of legislation but more in terms of social context. Maybe there is room for covering this. I do not see how we could do it in the present law without destroying the very careful work, the very precise set of ground rules the legislation has established.

[John Williams, Reform, St. Albert, AB]

What is the member proposing?

[Ted McWhinney, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

I am proposing that we adopt the law as it stands. It is a good law. Let us see how it works. We can always try one year later to do something more.

However, do not attempt to make a law that has a precise role and mission into an omnibus bill to cover just about everything else. Stick with the integrity of the law. Rest with the fact that in definitional terms of describing and identifying categories of conduct that must be registered this does represent an advance. The search for the a priori definition, cute as it may seem in the privacy of a member's own office, is not realistic in terms of the dialectical and empirical process that will operate as courts, parliamentarians and parliamentary committees react to this.

Again, I congratulate the committee on an excellent piece of work, the subcommittee in particular. It is a good law. In terms of comparative legislation it is an advance compared with similar legislation in other parts of the world.

[Michel Bellehumeur, Bloc, Berthier—Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, faced with a block of 22 motions like the one before the House today, I find it rather difficult to comment on every single one. What we have is two or three substantial motions, around which other motions have been grouped to provide more transparency, plus additional elements to achieve what Parliament has set out to do with Bill C-43.

To appreciate these amendments, including Motion No. 2, I think some background information might be useful to see what led Parliament to make this statement on influence peddling and lobbying. The Parliament of Canada has examined this question twice before. We had the Cooper committee's report in 1986 and recently, in 1993, we had the report from the Holtmann committee.

These committees looked into exactly the same aspects of lobbying as the present committee did today, in 1995. It is interesting to note that the Holtmann report published a series of recommendations, the first few being the most significant. These recommendations said, more or less, that for legislation like the bill before the House today to be truly effective, it would be necessary to remove all distinctions between lobbyists.

As you know, in the existing legislation, there are three types of lobbyists: the so-called Tier I and Tier II and a third group. There are in-house lobbyists, professional lobbyists and the others, organizations that lobby the government. The Holtmann committee concluded that lobbying was lobbying.

Whether people want to influence the government to obtain a contract, lower the rates in certain regulations, get a permit or obtain government assistance for their organization, this is all lobbying. People try to influence the government for their own purposes, for the benefit of the company for which they work or for the benefit of an association or whatever. In its first three or four recommendations, the Holtmann report said that distinctions between lobbyists should be eliminated.

I am sure you will remember this, Mr. Speaker. If I am not mistaken, the Liberals were to implement the Holtmann report from A to Z-this was a campaign promise made by the Liberals, by people acting in good faith, people who knew what they were doing in the enthusiasm of the moment-which means

that indirectly, and without exactly saying so, they made a commitment to eliminate all distinctions between lobbyists.

In committee, however, when I started to realize that Canadians had been fooled once again, I was very disappointed. I heard members who had been part of the committee that produced the Holtmann report say the exact opposite of what they signed when they tabled the report, with respect to these distinctions, for instance. There are a lot of other examples, particularly with regard to categories, which was the important element of the Holtmann report. It was not just anyone who was opposed. It was the people, who, today, hold fairly important positions in the government and who could influence it and talk it into meeting its campaign commitments.

But no. Throughout the whole time we heard witnesses in committee, some witnesses were in favour of eliminating categories, others were less so. The closer we got to the category of lobbyists capable of influencing government, in the back rooms of power, the greater the likelihood of their not really favouring the elimination of categories.

On the whole, however, the witnesses were in favour of greater transparency. We were sort of the guinea pigs in a new approach to examining bills and we were given a little more freedom. We were part of a pilot project, in a way, considering this bill under a new set of rules. We therefore did not adopt the principle of the bill at second reading, and, accordingly, we were able to broaden Bill C-43 from what the witnesses said and from the input of each of the parties. Members' work had to be given greater consideration, etc. It was all very fine.

Therefore, through a procedural swap and an exchange between members of the opposition and members of the government, we negotiated and we discussed, and I was ready to make a concession on the categories, so there would be only two instead of three. My first thought was to have a single category. However, it is better to bend a bit to achieve part of the desired objective than to risk missing it completely. So, I was ready to bend and to recommend to the members of the Bloc Quebecois that they support an amendment that would reduce the three categories to two. There would then be the category of in-house lobbyists (corporate) and professionals and the category of in-house lobbyists (organizations). All lobbyists would then be in two categories.

Before Christmas, this was accepted by just about everyone around the table. After Christmas, well, I do not know who had been making telephone calls, or what lobby had exerted influence or what, but everything was off. The amendments proposed to the committee were rejected by the government. Today, with Motion No. 2, the government could rectify the situation. Motion No. 2 now before us this morning is a carbon copy, or just about, of what I presented in committee in order to eliminate categories of lobbyists and have only one.

I do not imagine that anyone here has anything against lobbying per se. It does not matter whether organizations are non-profit or profit making, if they lobby in an attempt to influence the government, they have to abide by the rules.

To get approval for a single tier of lobbyists for all organizations, including community agencies, that is the purpose of clause 4(2) of Bill C-43, which I discussed earlier with respect to government initiative, which would eliminate people who might not agree to being recognized as lobbyists on the same terms as professional lobbyists. However, the government accepted the first amendment but did not accept what would have been consequential on the amendment, which was to have a single tier of lobbyists.

I have a few examples that will show why it is important-and when I say lobby, I mean lobby-to make C-43 a bill that has clout, that has teeth, as they say. There were organizations like MATRAC, for instance. I do not know if you remember this, Mr. Speaker, but when cigarette smuggling was going on in January and February 1994, there was an organization called MATRAC, a non-profit organization that sought to have taxes lowered. I have no objection to that. We in the official opposition were in favour of reducing these taxes. However, MATRAC initially gave the impression of being a non-profit organization. In other words, it worked for the benefit of its members and did not enjoy any immediate benefit.

It could be called a non-profit organization, which would come under the third heading in the bill before the House today. However, if we look a little closer at MATRAC, we realize that it was 100 per cent financed by the cigarette manufacturers in order to get taxes down. This is a clear instance of trying to influence the government on an important matter, tax revenues. Why have a separate tier for such a group? I am of the opinion that the act should deal with that by allowing a single tier of lobbyists. But no. I believe we must conclude that lobbyists on Parliament Hill have manged to influence the government with respect to a bill that was supposed to limit their influence. That is the obvious conclusion.

They made certain commitments with respect to the tier system before the election. Now they are in government, they can implement what they promised to do, but they are not doing it. In addition, that would explain why we could create just one category to make the process more transparent and to give everybody in this country the impression that they are all being treated equally. But no, the government did not do this. The lobbyists got involved, phone calls were made, and the Liberals buckled. They buckled like the Conservatives did and like others before them have done since Confederation. And they will keep on buckling until they are doubled over. I cannot wait to see the day that happens in the House. I mean I will no longer be in the House when that day comes, but will watch the spectacle from the outside.

One motion in this set of motions is extremely important, and that is Motion No. 7 regarding political affiliation. This is another amendment I proposed to the committee, and it would make it easier for taxpayers to identify which lobbyists are politically affiliated with the government or with any other party. For example, I helped organize party X's election victory. I would have to mention in my return that I contributed to the election campaign and that I was the political organizer of Mr. X or Ms. Y. I think that is what transparency is all about. What does the government have against making the process more transparent? I do not know. But if they were not against the idea, they would have included it in Bill C-43 and they did not.

I will conclude my remarks, for I see that my time is up. This is yet another good example of this government's double talk: one tune before the election, another after. Once again, taxpayers will have to foot the bill for this, and they still will not know why Bill C-43 was introduced, which was to make the process more transparent in order to obtain answers to our questions.

This has some implications for the Pearson issue. With Bill C-43, we will still be in the dark and will not know any more than what the newspapers have already disclosed regarding the matter. And that is deplorable.

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Lisgar—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege for me to speak on Bill C-43 and to support my colleagues in the House.

Rebuild trust in government, is that not a familiar term? In Manitoba last month I heard these words repeated because it is having a provincial election today. Mr. Mulroney in 1983 when he defeated the Liberal government of the day said we have to do away with corruption, rebuild trust in government, lobbyists are overdoing it, ripping us off.

The hon. member for St. Albert mentioned a 747 flying through a loop. The "Fifth Estate" about a month ago showed how two lobbyists flew 34 airbuses through the loops the Conservatives had put out. A couple of lobbyists have received $20 million. They can be identified by their accounts in Swiss banks. When I heard that I assumed we were to have a government that would crack down on stuff like this and we would be debating it in the House the next day. I have heard nothing about it.

Why do we want to pass the bill if we never want to do something about it by cleaning up the corruption? In Manitoba over the last month I heard about the terrible mess the Conservatives made of the health care system. They paid $4 million to an American lobbyist to tell them how to fix their health care system and they do not have one.

Why are we debating this bill? Why do we not have some action? We have had rules and regulations before. One very good example took place about a year ago in the subcommittee on transport. Every member, Liberal, Bloc and Reform, said to stop the backtracking. The backtracking issue over the last two years has cost us $60 million. We had total support from the committee to stop it. Who was lobbying the agriculture minister and the transport minister to continue with this? I talked with the railways and they said there was no way they had lobbied for it because they would be shipping grain regardless.

I talked to the wheat board people. They said they did not export grain and that it was the registered grain companies that did that. I talked to the grain companies and they told me it was the wheat board that insisted they do it.

I looked at the facts and found that we do not sell grain delivered to a foreign country. It is Appleby, Thunder Bay or Appleby, Vancouver. This backtracking has cost us $60 million. Are the American lobbyists lobbying our government to give them money to backtrack the grain so they can have it a little cheaper? This concerns me.

We are passing bills. We are passing rules and regulations but nobody seems to want to enforce them. What good are we in Parliament when we all agree on doing something and then have lobbyists change the system? Now the WGTA will correct it. However, we have allowed it to go on for two years and we knew about it.

I am beginning to wonder whether we should all stay at home and leave these lobbyists instead of sitting in Parliament day after day trying to pass regulations. I am sure we have laws on the books that would prosecute these people for ripping off the taxpayers, the only lobbyists we should be listening to.

On the last day in the House on the gun legislation, what happened to the three members who finally listened to the lobbyists in their constituencies and had the guts to stand up in the House and vote no? They have been muzzled, shut up. When that hit Manitoba there was a backlash which I believe blew the election for the Liberals. Why would we elect people who are not even allowed to get up in the House to speak their minds and represent their constituents?

They are some of the best backbenchers the Liberals have. I have worked with them.

It is very sad when we have to witness this day after day and our country is deeper and deeper in debt.

People who have the guts to get up and say something are not allowed to say it. It is time we realize that when there are amendments made that will be beneficial to taking corruption out of the system we should support them, not because they are made by the Reform Party or the Bloc, but because they are good for the country.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, no one on this side of the House fears recrimination for standing up and speaking out on issues.

Members have heard the Prime Minister say on many occasions that quite often we have a much better debate within our own party than we have in the House because sometimes the opposition does not get to the complexity and the depths of issues. The member who spoke previously really distorted this bill.

I was one of the most outspoken members in opposition on amending the Lobbyist Registration Act. There were three very specific areas we amended in this bill. I will talk about where I feel I did not get everything I wanted.

We have in the bill now things that make it much better. We now have in the loop all grassroots lobbying. That is important but was not a deal breaker for me. Another thing that really concerned me in opposition was communications techniques used by lobbyists. We knew lobbyists used polling and advertising. They sometimes spent millions of dollars in advertising and no one knew how the mood of the nation or the House was being affected.

This bill was amended to include a declaration of all those communication techniques so those in the House who have to deal with a lobby coming at them not just from a lobbyist but also from the way a market can be manipulated now know the techniques being used.

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Lisgar—Marquette, MB]

What about if you used the lobbyists for input. What if the government wants the input from the lobbyists?

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

I will come back to that. Let me state the three things in the bill which the member did not mention when he said this bill did not have any teeth.

Another thing in this bill has to do with contingency fees. The example the member used about the air bus situation, obviously it was not an hourly fee.

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Lisgar—Marquette, MB]

Twenty million dollars, no matter what it is.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

That was obviously a contingency fee and in this bill there is a provision to look at contingency fees.

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Lisgar—Marquette, MB]

Do something about it.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member keeps saying do something about it. We are saying that it is in the bill. He has to read the bill and he will see it is there.

I was a little disappointed with one area. I have been campaigning for six years on comprehensive tax reform. Five years later there is one little mention in the Globe and Mail . It is not easy to get things through the House and we do not always get everything we want.

There were some substantial amendments to this bill that I think go a long way in creating transparency. I felt uncomfortable about the declaration of fees. We did not get that one through, but it does not take away from this being a good bill.

I want to deal with Motion No. 7, which I am opposed to. It is a Reform amendment: "Past political or government work and political contributions over $1,000 shall be disclosed".

I am totally opposed to the Reform amendment.

[Jay Hill, Reform, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

That does not surprise us.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

Let me tell you why I am opposed to this. What we need to do, and you are eventually going to discover this-

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member has been here since 1988. For the 400th time, I imagine, would he please put his remarks to the Chair.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my humble apologies. In fact, I have been in this town since 1980 so I should know better.

I am opposed to this motion because I believe that as members of Parliament our greatest challenge is trying to attract people to participate in the political process. I believe that our responsibility is to attract-

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Lisgar—Marquette, MB]

Your greatest challenge is trying to attract constituents.