Evidence of meeting #48 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was loans.
A video is available from Parliament.
11:55 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Chair, do I have another 30 seconds? How's my time?
11:55 a.m.
Conservative
John Williamson Conservative New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I'm wondering if, getting back to first principles, the solution doesn't just rest in terms of dealing with past outstanding obligations in future—I guess this applies more to leadership—removing that $1,200 one-time donation, allowing it to be multi-year, and frankly, just keeping the heat on individuals to raise money. We have generous tax receipts for candidates. Is that not perhaps the solution, being able to go back to donors time and time again?
11:55 a.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
In any case, that will have to be done because those loans can only be reimbursed out of contributions. That has to happen. The question I posed already to the committee is whether we need to ensure that there is level access for all Canadian citizens and whether allowing for a seed loan to get a campaign started would better serve the democratic system.
11:55 a.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Thank you for the testimony today. It's helpful.
The suggestion of removing all personal loans—because it's so complicated to try to understand when someone hits their limit. It's a moving target. In terms of putting that to banks and credit unions...and obviously we're going to have hear from them, I think, as a committee. We're making a bunch of assumptions about what they will and won't do, and I don't think anyone around here is necessarily right, and I don't think Elections Canada can assume either.
If you have a guarantor who comes in to guarantee the loan, which from personal experience is something that my credit union was interested in, that then prevents that person from donating to the campaign because that's an assumed contribution, even though they haven't donated a dollar. Is that correct?
Noon
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
So it's not a perfect scenario, in the sense that some campaigns don't have a lot of deep-pocket donors and people who are willing to.... It's complicated as well if you take out a $50,000 loan. You then have to marshal together enough people at $1,200 a person to guarantee that loan.
Noon
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Or ask your party or riding association to guarantee it.
Noon
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Right. For a general election, it may be one thing; for a leadership race, it may be quite another.
Noon
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
I understand the idea of getting rid of individual loans. We're trying to have that tension, as you just said, between accessibility to the political system while not allowing money to buy politics, to buy leadership races, right? Someone once said that money in politics is like rain on a sidewalk; it finds its way through the cracks.
There were some loopholes created in the last law big enough to drive a truck through, in terms of personal loans, to circumvent these limits and allow people to blow through limits that were intended to have fairness.
You've suggested the idea that if somebody has exceeded those limits on his personal loan front and hasn't paid them back—you talk about a three-year window—they should not be permitted to run again. This is a pretty strong thing for a chief electoral officer to suggest, to ban someone from running based on the idea that they've been irresponsible or negligent. It almost infers—and I know you're not inferring—that perhaps the candidate took that money knowing they couldn't pay it back. It was a way to circumvent the limits on contributions that applied to everybody else in the race, if you follow me.
It's a three-year ban or a ban on not running because of a three-year limit. That's what your suggestion is, correct?
Noon
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Until those debts are repaid.
Again, when I suggest that, I go from.... We need to balance all the principles here and the objectives. If we are truly concerned about bringing finality to those debts, I think we need to think of other measures than the ones that are in Bill C-21.
Noon
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
It's interesting to me, because it is, as I said—and I don't want to put words in your mouth—a pretty severe consequence: you cannot run until these debts are taken care of. The challenge, again, through some personal experience, is that the hope and optimism of a candidate sometimes exceed the economic realities that also face that candidate. You can be convinced; I resisted, I guarantee you that.
But the notion, particularly in general elections, of either that person not being able to run or the party having to subsume that debt...this level playing field you talked about earlier I think remains critical: access to the political environment.
I don't think it was fair. You passed over the comments about two candidates: one traditionally able to access lines of credit, loans from a financial institution, middle-aged white male, versus a young female candidate walking into the same institution or treated the same. That doesn't meet with the reality that exists within our financial institutions today. It's a hangover from days past, but it still exists.
Can we just simply wash over that piece and say that banks will be neutral on whomever walks through their front doors?
Noon
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
There are several aspects to your question. I want to be clear. To my mind, we need to distinguish candidates from leadership contestants. These are separate entities and separate contests.
In the case of candidates, what I put forward in my remarks is that the party becomes liable for those debts after three years, with no civil order or sanction for the candidate. The party itself may decide not to endorse that candidate in future elections.
Where we seem to have difficulty is with regard to leadership contestants.
Noon
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
One of the proposals I put forward was that in the extreme case where the debts are not reimbursed...I don't believe, personally, that imposing further fines on those individuals will help resolve the situation; it just aggravates it.
12:05 p.m.
NDP
12:05 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
We need to look at other mechanisms. We could look at making the party responsible for the leadership contestants' debts, but again, I think the parties would have views on that.
12:05 p.m.
NDP
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Is that not fraud, in the sense that some candidates will be viewed more preferably by the party than institutional candidates coming from within, and is that your reluctance?
12:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
I'll let you finish that piece. I was really interested and wasn't watching the time, and then I looked down and you're a whole minute past.
12:05 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Another alternative would be—which I agree would be an extreme measure—to prevent them from running again in future events. Maybe we can think of other....
I know that in Quebec the approach taken to resolve this is to make the candidate personally liable for the debts that are outstanding at the end of the contest. But again, it's not an easy, foolproof solution to the issue of a leadership race, I must say.