Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 28th, 2013

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

I've seen him work out. Bowling, it doesn't matter. No, he's a bowler too.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

I knew that too, that's why I threw it in.

We'll suspend for a minute while we allow our witnesses to leave and our other witnesses to come.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Order, please.

We have two further witnesses.

Mr. Garrison, it's great to have you here today. Mr. Zimmer, it's always good to see you, too.

We've given you both only a very short time today because we've been pre-reading your reports, and they're maybe not as complicated as those of our last two guests.

Mr. Garrison, would you go first for five minutes, please.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Thank you for hearing me today. I could be here today talking about something as complex as the previous presentations, but the good news for Vancouver Island is that we have had an extra seat added. The commission had to make some difficult choices. While their report doesn't really reflect what most of the people in my existing riding wanted, I think there's an acceptance that, in order to get a new seat, some changes have to be made, and there weren't a lot of good choices.

Having said that, what I focus on here is trying to give a name to the riding that people will actually understand locally. I know most of you won't know the geography or understand any of this, but the basic problem is that the commission accepted one thing that I said. The municipality of Saanich makes up about 30% of my existing riding, and its name didn't appear. So when I was knocking on doors, I had people saying I was in the wrong place, the Saanich Gulf Islands is where they lived. I would respond by saying, “No, you are actually in Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca.”

So the commission added the name “Saanich” but then retained Juan de Fuca. But in their division of my riding, which was very large, they put most of the provincial riding called Juan de Fuca in the riding called Cowichan—Malahat—Langford. So, by retaining the name “Juan de Fuca” in their new riding, they've actually confused the public because those in the provincial riding will live in the other federal riding of the same name, if you follow me.

What I did was I sat down and asked if there was a historical name that connects all of these people. There isn't. So I simply said that, because it's a triangle riding, let's just use the triangle points. You can't name all the communities and, if you name the triangle points, everybody will know which riding they're in. What order they went in caused a lot of local discussion, so I suggested that it be alphabetical. So it's called Esquimalt—Saanich Sooke.

I submitted the resolution of the Esquimalt council. They were very concerned because Esquimalt has been the name of a riding for at least 60 years. In the proposed new name, by geography, people in Esquimalt would not think they were in that riding, so we create a new problem of exclusion if we go with the proposed name.

Really, that's it. It's a triangle with Esquimalt at one point, Saanich at another point, and Sooke at the other. The communities in between would not be named. They'll be disappointed, I think, but they'll know which riding they're in.

That's all I'm asking you to consider today. It's a very simple proposal.

I've checked with the members of Parliament for Victoria, Saanich—Gulf Islands, and Nanaimo—Cowichan, and all of them support this change.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

All right. We'll have Mr. Zimmer give his piece, and then we'll question you both.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Thanks for letting me appear today.

My rationale is that in Prince George—Peace River, which is our riding name now, we have a significant portion of it that is termed the Northern Rockies as a regional district, but it's not represented in the current name. What I am proposing is that we add the name “Northern Rockies” to the original name, so it would be “Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies”.

I do have the support of the mayor of Fort Nelson, which is the main community within the Northern Rockies regional district. He is happily supportive of it and hopes that it'll make it through.

I did actually make this submission to the Electoral Boundaries Commission in October and I'm just going to read that letter out to you now. I apologize for not having it in French. We made it in English, so the French is actually being done as we speak.

Dear Mr. Justice J. E. Hall, I am writing the Federal Electoral Boundaries Commission for British Columbia today to propose changing the name of the electoral district of Prince George—Peace River to Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies. As the Member of Parliament for this riding, I do not believe the current name for this electoral district fully represents the people and communities that live within the proposed boundaries. According to the most recent census, the Northern Rockies Regional District has a land area of 85,111 square kilometres. This land area represents a significant portion of the proposed district and I believe changing the name to Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies would more realistically represent the riding as a whole. Thank you in advance for your consideration of this proposal. Should the Commission have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact my office.

Lastly, I did answer the question Mr. Dion asked previously as to whether I'd seen the six questions. I have.

What is the rationale for the objection? To me it recognizes the unrecognized.

Does your objection have community support? Yes it does; it has the mayor's support.

What are the demographic consequences of the changes you're proposing? There really are none. There are no travel issues or anything. It's actually a positive in that it recognizes them.

Is there a domino effect? No, it is the largest unrepresented region by name.

Is your objection a repeated argument made before the commission? As I said, I submitted the letter, which I just read, on October 16, 2012.

Have you talked to your colleagues about the proposed changes? Yes. When we originally went around to get signatures for support to make the change, I told the 10 people who I had sign my document what I planned on doing, and then they signed it. So they endorsed it.

That's it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Super, thank you both for being succinct.

Mr. Lukiwski, do you want to go first? Let's just go one or two minutes each.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Sure, thanks very much.

Normally when it comes to name changes, I don't have a lot of questions. One question is to provide me with a little update. Are the boundaries of either or both of your two ridings changing whatsoever from where they are currently?

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Yes. My existing riding has a larger population than P.E.I.’s, 138,000. About one-third of my riding is moving to what is essentially a new riding on Vancouver Island. Of course I'm disappointed to lose any of those constituents, but they have to make the switch one way or the other to create a new riding because my riding is too large. I either lose people on the west end or I lose people on the north end. The geography means somebody has to go.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Bob, what about yours?

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Tom, look at the two maps I've handed out, the existing boundaries on one sheet and the proposed boundaries on the next. All that's changed is the very southern tip of the riding. We added Valemount to the riding. It was a pure geographical challenge for the other MP. I said that I'm already going to be down there, and for me it's a half-hour trip, so we added Valemount to my riding. That's the only change we're making.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

The only other question I have, and I think you've both answered it, is for confirmation.

You've consulted with members of your constituency, your riding, and no one has objected. Randall, you said that some people may feel left out, but the triangle points you've given really define the riding. Are you suggesting that there are no real objections that you’ve found in your riding to the name change you're suggesting?

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

I've been on talk radio, all kinds of things, and there's been a surprising amount of interest over the name. People get quite excited. The only thing they said was, “Well, I guess you can't list them all, right? You can't list all 10 communities”. Other than that, no. People agreed that by choosing the end points, it does tell people what riding they live in and solves that problem.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Bob, any objections to your name change?

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Quite the opposite. It's a beautiful part of the country, as most Canadians would agree. To add it to my riding of Prince George–Peace River, when we have the Rockies running right through it, it's an understatement, I would say, that it just adds that element for us. There's absolutely no opposition.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Thanks.

That's all, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

That's great.

Madame Latendresse, go ahead.

[Alexandrine Latendresse, NDP, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you for your comments.

You gave your presentation to the commission. Why do you think they didn't agree with your recommendation?

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

I still think that's up to PROC to decide. I submitted it on October 16, so I think the process is still ongoing.

[Alexandrine Latendresse, NDP, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

I am talking about the commission. You went to the commission's public hearings and you gave your presentation.

[Bob Zimmer, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

No, I didn't attend the public hearings. I just sent the letter.

[Alexandrine Latendresse, NDP, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

I see.

Unless I'm mistaken, generally the commissions tried to shorten the names. In fact, the names of some ridings, especially in Quebec, are made up of four or five community names. So they are quite long. There was this desire to have names that were a bit shorter. I was wondering if that was the case. Unless I'm mistaken, none of you spoke about the names during the public hearings of the commissions.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

I suggested adding Saanich, which they did. When we were on talk radio, there was some discussion that the riding should be called “Esquimalt–Saanich Sooke is awesome”, and when the Speaker would call on the member, he would always say, “the member for Esquimalt–Saanich Sooke is awesome”.

Other than that—

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you for that statement.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

On the question of names, what the commission actually said was, “We aren't going to pay too much attention because we know that you will fuss with them at the PROC committee later”. They actually said that at our hearing.