Bob Mackin has an interesting piece on former B.C. Liberal cabinet minister John Les’s new role as a lobbyist for the anti-garbage incinerator forces. Some thoughts:

1. First off, and it should be said strongly, Les is on the right side of this issue – giving Metro Vancouver a trash monopoly will cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Read our work on it here, here and here.

2. Second, Les’s role was revealed through the accountability that comes with the B.C. Lobbyists’ Registry being posted online. So that’s good – at least we know.

3. That said, there should absolutely be a cooling-off period on lobbying governments you just served in. Two years at minimum. It’s unseemly to step down from a government and then immediately begin lobbying it.

4. No MLA should be allowed to lobby while collecting their 15-month severance.

5. If you look at the Lobbyists’ Registry, you will find the names of dozens of campaign workers from both sides of the fence (Liberal and NDP). They work on campaigns and then lobby the politicians they help get elected. This begs a bigger question, one which I am still rolling around in my brain. Is it better to have lobbyists, political staffers and government relations types work these campaigns as we do in Canada, and then become part of the internal workings of the government they help elect – or is the U.S. model of professional campaign staff, who go from race to race to race, better? Someone has to work these campaigns, and qualified volunteers are few and far between… so what’s the best model?

6. To see the kind of social inbreeding among politicians, staffers, media, lobbyists and socialites, that can occur in a political environment – check out This Town, by Mark Leibovich, chronicling the club that runs Washington, D.C. It’s fascinating and terrifying all at once.