Chief Minister Andrew Barr has backed the Integrity Commission to consider the impact of lobbying on the ACT's political system.
Mr Barr said his government would give serious consideration to any request from the anti-corruption watchdog for more resources that would enable it to launch an investigation into lobbying.
"I thank the commissioner for raising it. And I think there is a pathway forward on that," Mr Barr said.
Integrity Commissioner Michael Adams KC on Friday said an investigation into the impact of lobbying in the ACT was on his "wish list" but his agency did not have the resources required to launch the probe.
Mr Adams said he was eager to investigate the issue following revelations about the activities of the powerful Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union.
No allegations have been made against the ACT branch of the union, but ACT Labor has suspended donations from all branches while an independent investigation takes place.
"I don't have the resources at present. It's on my wish list to undertake," Mr Adams told the Legislative Assembly's budget estimates inquiry on Friday.
Mr Barr said everyone in public life had experienced public lobbying from a wide variety of organisations.
Banning political donations in the ACT from property developers had already had a positive impact on the culture of lobbying in the territory, he said.
"I would say that a high percentage of meetings that are requested with ministers and indeed with public officials are, broadly speaking, some form of lobbying," he said on the sidelines of the ACT Labor conference.
"The issue really that the Integrity Commission could particularly apply, in its educative role, is how best elected officials can manage that in a contemporary environment.
"I mean, I have people who want to seek to negotiate the level of taxation or taxation arrangements and lobby on those questions. You see in federal politics an extraordinary amount of lobbying that goes into policy settings and other occasions."
Mr Barr said he met with community groups who were looking for access to a government grant, which was a form of lobbying "in one form or another".
"I think there certainly is room for that sort of work and I think it fits very squarely with the Integrity Commission's educative role rather I guess than its investigative role," he said.
Mr Adams had said while he would make the case for more resources, "throwing bodies at the investigation does not always make for efficient, timely conclusions".
"The problem with dividing up large branches of evidence is that team or person A doesn't know what person B is looking at. And person B doesn't know what person C is looking at," he said.
"Ultimately, it all has to come together in one mind, one way or another, so that merely having 10 people, look at a very large range of evidence, you might find is far less efficient than having three or four."
