Nice Stories to Read on a Monday Morning

Warren Kinsella is gloating this morning with a link over at his blog to this story.  It seems that there are lots of Conservative Party political staffers shopping resumes on the street in case they won’t make it back into government after the next election.  It’s exactly the kind of story that Liberals across the country will love to read. I admit I had the same somewhat gloating smirk on my face as Warren when I read it.  Why are people worried?

"The rationale for doing that is you get out before you become damaged goods, first of all. And then, secondly, there’s less competition now than there will be whenever everybody gets dumped [after an election defeat]. So, there’ve been conversations in which they were [ministerial staffers] exploring their options," said one lobbyist.

My favourite part is Tim Powers’ non-denial of the story:

"I don’t know if people are necessarily figuring to lose, but the minority Parliament—regardless of whether you win or lose—is a precarious situation and for many people who have been around for two or three years, now is a natural time to look.

That’s not the strongest line to take, especially not when it is followed by: “he conceded that some exempt staffers have contacted his firm”

UPDATE: Intrepid live-blogger-queen-of-the-blackberry Kady O’Malley raises a perfectly fair question: Is it appropriate for ministerial staffers to be begging for jobs from lobbyists while at the very same time, they’re still employed to give objective advice to government ministers on what to do about the same lobbyists’ campaigns to change government policy?  Also, the Conservatives passed this law (something called the Accountability Act) which prohibited ministerial staffers from lobbying for five years after they leave the government payroll.  So what exactly are these staffers going to be doing for the first 5 years on the job?