The Art of Influence_ The how and why of Lobbying

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - The recent Investigative Journalism Foundation exposé on lobbying, prior to Mark Carney’s first budget, fits a familiar pattern. Industry logged hundreds of hours of consultation with government officials. By way of contrast, the environmental sector has little representation. They are not even mentioned in this report! What does this mean? Cortes Currents asked Jennifer Lash, who has been both the founder of a non-profit society and a senior government analyst, for her insight into why the system is important and how it works. Jennifer Lash: “The term lobby comes from the area around the House of Commons where the different parties gather when they’re not actually in the House. That’s where people used to go and meet with them to share their perspectives on things. They were meeting in the lobby, so these people became known as lobbyists. That’s where the term comes from, and anyone is lobbying if they’re meeting with an MP or a bureaucrat and advocating for something.” “If I was working for a not-for-profit organization and went to meet with the Minister of the Environment and was advocating for certain policies, I would be lobbying them. Quite often we use the term lobbyists to mean people who are paid to do this. Large lobbying firms specialize in government relations; they know all the people to meet with, and they often have relationships with people in government. Organizations and companies will hire these firms to help get access to people.” “It’s a very common thing that’s done. Anybody can hire a lobbyist. Not-for-profit organizations will hire lobby firms, and companies will hire lobby firms.” “Where it gets a little bit more controversial—and where people have concerns—is the fact that hiring lobbyists can be expensive. Usually the only entities that can afford to hire lobbyists are companies, such as oil and gas companies, where they have a lot of profit and there’s a lot at stake financially. So they’ll invest a lot of money in hiring a lobby firm to advocate for what they want, whereas not-for-profit organizations like climate advocacy groups don’t have that budget and can’t afford to hire lobby firms. They have less time and capacity to be able to advocate for what they want.” “Quite often it’s interpreted that if the government has met with far more people from the oil and gas industry, they are going to reflect the position of the oil and gas industry. I’m just picking on the oil and gas industry in this example. It could be mining companies; it could be any companies that have more money. Quite often we’ll see reports that say the government met with lobbyists from natural resource development companies far more than they met with environmental groups; therefore, they’re leaning that way.” “That’s, of course, very possible. Ultimately, it’s up to the politicians and the bureaucrats to make the right decisions and to listen to the information and make the decisions that are right. In a perfect world, it wouldn’t matter if you meet with one company 10 times and another organization one time; that shouldn’t shift the weight of the decision. You should still be making the decision in the best interest of Canadians. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes, if you have had more time with some groups over others, you will tend to lean in that direction. It gets a little bit more difficult.”