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.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
I just have one question. I had two questions initially, but Mr. Scott took one of them.
My question relates to your suggestion that if a candidate has not paid off debts, that candidate would be unable to run again, and I must say, I worry that this sort of thing would have the effect of hitting certain classes of individuals in a way that would be tougher than it would be for other classes of individuals.
If we're thinking about a formal campaign for Parliament, individuals who would run as independent candidates would have a much harder time paying off their debts than would those who could be assisted by their parties. This suggestion would have the effect of discriminating against independent candidates, who would have to be much, much more careful about running.
Given the fact that independent candidates typically stand the best chance of having an impact, not in a general election but in a byelection, which might very well be called a short time before a general election, you could see a situation in which someone who runs, and who has to spend a bit and go into debt to run a credible campaign, is then prohibited from running again. I worry very much about that. I just throw it out as a note of caution to you.
12:20 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Oh, absolutely. Again, I just want to clarify that when I'm.... That consideration of prohibiting someone from entering a contest would be for leadership contestants. I didn't have that in mind for a candidate.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
Oh, I see. So purely for leadership contests...?
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Yes, because there's no mechanism there to bring an end to this debt load. The last resort...and I agree with everyone that it would be a last-resort measure that they would be stopped from entering future contests.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
I apologize. I misunderstood what you were getting at.
Thank you.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I just wanted to quickly follow up, Mr. Mayrand, on one comment. In your discussion with Mr. Cullen about alternatives to which entities would be ultimately responsible for an unpaid loan, we were discussing the national party a little bit, for example. You did say that possibly one option could be to consider it—because you mentioned Quebec—and it could be that the debt falls back on the candidate.
I just want to double-check. My understanding is that if we did this, we would in effect be circumventing the whole issue of candidates not being able to fund their own campaigns. Would you agree with that?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
I would tend to agree, yes. Hopefully you will have officials from Quebec to explain their regime, but that's my understanding of their regime.
12:20 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Okay, so they would have that problem. Thank you.
You started out, in almost your first or second sentence of the critique part of your presentation, talking about the relationship between this and the provision of goods and services and how they could be provided on credit, for example. I want to take that just a tiny bit further. It may just be that I have not read this closely enough or do not understand the system well enough, but does the idea of a loan in kind come up at all?
For example, we've had cause to discuss recently in the House issues of preferential funding for providing certain services, such as flights within a riding where remote communities need to be contacted by candidates. If, in fact, a very good price is given by a corporate entity, or even the donation of a service, does that fall at all within the parameters of the idea of a loan?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
No, it falls within the parameters of a contribution.
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
It's a contribution in kind. It's the commercial value less the actual cost paid by the beneficiaries.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
So we don't need to worry about that with respect to this. The current regime under the Canada Elections Act covers the whole question of whether market value for particular kinds of services has been charged. Is that correct?
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
A few people were concerned that there might be a gap.
On this issue of an unpaid loan becoming a deemed contribution, we were cut off towards the end of my last question. I just want to make sure that we are clear and on record that your position is that if, for example, a financial institution gives a loan of $10,000, and it flips over and is unpaid at the end of three years and becomes a deemed contribution, nothing in the bill or currently in the Canada Elections Act turns that contribution into an offence.
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
That is correct. I think you have to look at all the circumstances of the transaction to figure out if it is.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
That's despite the fact that we know that a financial institution as a corporation can't give at all.
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
That's why I think we need to be careful, because in many circumstances, it may have started as a very legitimate loan. It cannot be turned suddenly, just by a fiction of the law, into a criminal offence.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Great.
Talking about fictions of the law, one means by which an unpaid loan can be dealt with is by having it be the subject of a binding agreement. If all a bank or the two actors have to do is enter into a new binding agreement, which looks to me just like another way of renewing the loan, isn't there the potential for this to be put off forever? Is that something you were referring to indirectly before?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
I haven't gone into the details of those provisions. Yes, and it's more than that. I don't have access to those documents. All I get is a notice that there's a binding agreement in place.
12:25 p.m.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
You have to approve this. According to proposed subsection 405.6(5), it's you, as the Chief Electoral Officer, who has to verify it. But you're telling us that you wouldn't have access to the details.
12:25 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada
Exactly, and that's why in my opening remarks I asked for additional authority if we want to pursue those provisions.
