Due to a change to the Lobbyists’ Code, where the definition of “associate” explicitly includes the staff that were at issue in the rulings, the issue of the Commissioner’s interpretation of “staff” is moot. [...] The Appellant has not pursued this Appeal with the objective of finding the lobbyists in violation of the Lobbyists’ Code, but rather, with the objective of ensuring that the Commissioner’s interpretation of the Lobbyists’ Code going forward is reasonable. [...] The Commissioner’s decisions were also unreasonable because, in interpreting Rule 6 and Rule 9, the Commissioner ignored the central purposes and principles set out in the Lobbyists’ Code requiring lobbyists to “observe the highest professional and ethical standards” and “conform fully with the letter and the spirit” of the Code in order to ensure lobbying is “done ethically and with the highest s. [...] Both the Commissioner and the FC unreasonably interpreted the future “will be affected” condition in the test for whether a lobbyist has placed an office holder in an apparent conflict of interest in violation of Rule 6, when in fact the test is “could be affected”.66 The Lobbyists’ Code is about regulating the behaviour of lobbyists before they act. [...] To effectively achieve the objective of the Lobbyists’ Code of ensuring public confidence in the integrity of government decision-making and of preventing lobbyists from placing office holders in even an apparent conflict of interest, Rules 6 and 9 (and the corresponding rules of the new Lobbyists’ Code) can only be reasonably interpreted to prohibit a person to whom a minister has a sense of obli.
- Pages
- 33
- Published in
- Canada
