Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2006

[David Chernushenko]

Certainly we will submit something.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

And the same thing, Ms. McGrath. You're willing to submit something.

We'll move to the next round. Monsieur Guimond.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Donison, I'd like to come back to something you said earlier and which sounds a lot like the answer I got from the Government House Leader.

The Prime Minister, even if he had a majority government, would retain the right or privilege, to a certain extent, of being able to go and see the Governor General and ask him or her to dissolve the Government for a valid reason.

Do you agree with me that what constitutes a good or major reason is totally subjective? It is certainly not objective information. In law, what you see as a good reason may not be what I consider a good reason; it's subjective.

Do you remember the pretext Jean Chrétien used to call an election in 2000, when he had just been re-elected in 1997? I remember it as if it happened yesterday. He was at Rideau Hall. After visiting the Governor General, reporters asked him why, when it had been less than four years since the last election, he had decided to call another. He answered that he needed a mandate from the people of Canada in order to spend the budget surpluses as he was intending to do.

[Marcel Proulx, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

That was a good reason.

[Marlene Jennings, Liberal, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC]

It was an excellent reason.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

As long as we have a fiscal imbalance, the federal Government will rack up budget surpluses while the provinces are in dire straits, and that won't change as long as they are part of that system.

Do you realize that the answer you gave earlier and the one I got last week from the Government House Leader was a subjective one: you say it will have to be for a good reason. But who will be able to decide what a good reason is? Of course, if the electorate feels it's a futile or a partisan reason, or that it's just an attempt to pull a fast one on the Opposition, it can always sanction the Government.

I'd be interested in hearing your comments.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Mr. Guimond, are you asking everyone, or only Mr. Donison?

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

I would like to hear from Mr. Donison first.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

Mr. Donison, please.

[Michael D. Donison]

Mr. Chair, I think I can only refer to what I said before. We cannot alter the legal situation. You're right, it is a bit subjective, but unless there's a national crisis or in the case of a majority government, for some reason--which is rare in our system, or almost impossible--the government loses the confidence of the House, I think we have to maintain the flexibility of the responsible government model.

I think the reality is that a prime minister.... You cite the example of 2000, and I would also cite the same thing that happened in the 1997 election with a federal majority Liberal government; and the same thing happened in 2004. Those were all premature elections, and I would submit to you that in the case of Mr. Chrétien in 1997--I'll try not to be partisan here, Mr. Guimond--and Mr. Chrétien in 2000 and Mr. Martin in 2004, those elections were all premature. They were all called clearly, I think--and there are books written on this--to catch the new opposition leading party with a new leader, flat-footed.

I would suggest to you that once this becomes law, a prime minister at his peril will attempt to do what Mr. Chrétien and Mr. Martin did in 1997, 2000, and 2004.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

But nothing in the current wording of this Bill guarantees that the same thing could not happen again. Certainly, the difference is that now the term is fixed. And don't tell me that if the Government has lost the confidence of the House... Imagine if we had a majority government. Let me give you an example. It goes without saying that if the Government has a minority and loses the confidence of the House, it will have no choice but to call an election.

I would just repeat what Ms. Michaëlle Jean said in interviews she gave to mark the end of the first year of her reign -- comments that really made me laugh. She said that the most difficult decision she had had to make in the last year was to dissolve Parliament. But she had no choice! She had better not try and have us believe that this was a difficult decision, that she was tortured and didn't sleep all night; the fact is she didn't have a choice! So please don't raise that argument.

If it were a majority government, and if the Bill passes with its current wording, would the Prime Minister still be able to call an election before the end of the term?

[Michael D. Donison]

Mr. Guimond, as I said earlier, there are no guarantees here. The only way you could have a guarantee is by amending the Constitution. We don't want to go down that route. But short of that, I think what you're going to find--again I cite experience--is that first ministers will tread.... That's the ultimate sanction on politicians, with all due respect: the ire of the electorate. I think that any prime minister, especially in a majority situation, who calls an early election after this becomes law will need to have a very, very good explanation for the Canadian people as to why he's calling the election early. Mr. Chrétien and Mr. Martin were not held accountable in that way in those three elections.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you very much.

That ends that slot, and it's Mr. Dewar, please, for five minutes.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

There are a couple of other questions that are outstanding with regard to this. I've been using the language “flexible fix”, because I think it's important for the citizenry to understand that this is a minority Parliament and we'd still have the opportunity for Parliament to fall and of course to go into an election.

In terms of participation, when we asked the folks in B.C. and the chief electoral officer there about their experience in encouraging—with reference, Mr. Donison, to Mr. Milner's paper—more women and visible minorities and aboriginal peoples to participate in the democratic process, she wasn't able to cite anything. I would hope when we look at this—it's a very important area, for us at least in the New Democratic Party, and I'm sure for everyone—that in and of itself, having this law is not enough. A couple of other things need to be done.

We've talked about enumeration. We need to put resources and any savings we can find—particularly if there are savings, and it's been mentioned that in B.C. there are some, because you are able to rent offices and hire people ahead of time and make some savings there—into an enumeration process that is truly democratic. We have censuses, we have tax time, we have many ways of gathering data, but we really need to put the pressure on an enumeration process that allows people not just to know when the date is, but be able to participate. I'll just mention that and see whether it's an issue among folks.

The other thing is, how do we get more women, more visible minorities, and more aboriginal people to both participate—and we don't have the data on that—and to stand as candidates, as was mentioned? We've done some things in our party, and I'm glad to say we have within our caucus a higher percentage of women in the House than any other party.

What are some of your thoughts about this? I'll just open it up to the panel.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

Perhaps this time we'll start with Monsieur Gardner. Are you prepared to answer?

[Gilbert Gardner]

I do not believe that Bill C-16 will really contribute to greater equity in terms of the candidates and the people who get elected. I think that there will have to be some profound changes within society before we will see greater equity, and I don't think Bill C-16 will in any way change the current, unfortunate reality.

There is another type of legislation, in parliamentary democracies across the planet, that sets a specific timeframe. For example, it states that an election must be held within a two-month period. If you compare voter turnout rates in those parliamentary democracies that have fixed dates with others that don't have them, you will see that there isn't much variation. Certainly, there are cultural traits associated with voter patterns, but as a general rule, there is not much variation in terms of turnout rates. Consequently, I don't think that the fact of having a fixed date or an approximate date will change the behaviour of the electorate in terms of their voting patterns.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

Mr. Chernushenko.

[David Chernushenko]

Thank you.

Given the—very few, I would say—tangible benefits of going down this road, when we start talking about flexible fixed election dates I'm left with the conclusion that this is much ado about nothing. If we want to keep certain aspects of our current system that allow flexibility, require responsible government, require the confidence of the House, we are left with a fixed election date that isn't fixed. This leads to the conclusion that there are much more important, more fundamental things that a government can be doing to address the democratic deficit than moving to fixed election dates.

So it comes back to our general point here today from the Green Party, which is that while we see no particular reason to oppose it, we also don't see why we should invest all these resources in moving ahead with it when there are others, such as proportional representation, such as looking at how within each party we can be getting more candidates from visible or non-visible minorities, more gender balance, etc..... I would rather see the effort go into that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I'm not sure that answered Mr. Dewar's question about how it would help the voter turnout of aboriginals and women. However, we are running out of time. Could we stick to the question, Mrs. McGrath, please?

[Anne McGrath]

Yes. Redirecting resources that are currently spent on a constant state of election readiness toward voter participation programs would be a very good benefit. We've seen some examples: Elections Canada has undertaken some programs in the past; other organizations like teacher's unions, for instance, did some excellent work trying to improve young peoples' participation in the vote--young people who aren't necessarily old enough to vote yet, but to improve that particular level of participation. Those things are very important.

With respect to participation as candidates and in other ways, specific measures must be taken. People here have asked a lot about studies. One study that always sticks in my mind is an International Labour Organization study in about the mid-nineties that said at the current rate of progress, women will achieve economic and political equality with men in about a thousand years. We need to do something.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Donison, I'm going to allow a short answer, so you can participate in this, but we are over time. Please.

[Michael D. Donison]

Mr. Chair, in my opening remarks I said the bill is incremental. It's not revolutionary and it's not going to solve all these problems. I still think it's an improvement.

Particularly in the case of recruiting more minorities, women, and aboriginal people, the mere fact that predictability has increased will raise all votes for all candidates, and therefore it will also raise for them as well. But I wasn't suggesting for one minute this bill is going to solve those kinds of problems and face all the political parties, but it's certainly a movement incrementally in the right direction. It improves the atmosphere and the predictability for all potential candidates.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

We're going to move to our next round, and I only have one name on the list for this third five-minute round, so I'm looking for names, if anybody wants to get on the list.

Monsieur Proulx.

[Marcel Proulx, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Donison, we've covered the possibility of the Prime Minister deciding he has a good reason. We've covered the possibility of running to the end. What if the government decides they're going to make sure to lose a confidence vote? What would the Governor General be able to say then?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

To whom was the question directed, Mr. Proulx?