Procedure and House Affairs Committee on May 4th, 2023

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

With that, we're suspending for five minutes, after which we will continue with our second panel. Please stay tuned.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

We are resuming the meeting.

For our second panel today, we have with us five members of Parliament: Charlie Angus, the member for Timmins—James Bay; Carol Hughes, the member for Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing; Viviane Lapointe, the member for Sudbury; Marc Serré, the member for Nickel Belt; and Terry Sheehan, the member for Sault Ste. Marie.

You will each have four minutes to make an opening statement, after which we will go to questions from members of the committee.

Ms. Lapointe, we will start with you. Welcome.

[Viviane LaPointe, Liberal, Sudbury, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Respected colleagues, I speak to you today both as chair of the Northern Ontario Liberal Caucus and as the Member of Parliament for Sudbury.

On behalf of the northern Ontario Liberal caucus, I would like to express our collective objection to the removal of an electoral district for northern Ontario. This objection is not about politics. Rather, this objection is rooted in advocacy.

Northern Ontario is unique from all other regions in Ontario due largely to its immense land mass. In fact, northern Ontario makes up 87% of Ontario's land mass. Reducing our representation to nine elected officials creates undue hardship and inequitable access to MPs for the people of northern Ontario. This undue hardship will also create greater challenges in attracting young people, especially women, to consider running for Parliament.

Land mass also affects communities of interest. Communities that are several hours apart may not have a common economy or shared issues. The loss of a seat may also have social and economic implications.

Northern Ontario has unique characteristics, such as a large indigenous population, and unique challenges, such as limited access to social services, health care and education. These issues require targeted policies that address the specific needs of the region. Removing a seat from northern Ontario would cut off an essential avenue for the region's voice to be heard.

Going by a numbers-only formula actually creates further voter disparity. It increases inequity and creates prejudice against rural and northern Canadian communities.

We believe the commission understood this inequality by creating two ridings of “extraordinary circumstance”. While the legislative path may be the ultimate manner in which equitable representation can be achieved, we cannot accept that there are no measures the commission can employ.

We have seen precedents that address the issue of land mass. The 1985 Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act provided for the Newfoundland and Labrador commission to deviate from adherence to the quota in order to maintain a manageable geographic size for sparsely populated districts.

In a vast country like ours, where each region has distinctive needs and priorities, representational equality is fundamental. The electoral district model is designed to ensure that citizens from each region are proportionally represented in the House of Commons. Any action that changes the number of seats provided to a region can affect its political representation entirely.

In conclusion, reducing the number of seats in northern Ontario is not the solution to any problem. Instead, it would create problems of its own by reducing the ability of the region's elected representatives to represent the interests of the people they serve.

Thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. Angus.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The redistribution proposal for northern Ontario represents a massive disruption in political representation. It arbitrarily breaks apart communities of interest and is predicated on the fundamentally flawed proposition that even though northern Ontario's population has grown since the last boundary changes, it isn't growing as fast as the explosive population growth in suburban-urban southern Ontario. From this flows the second false promise: that rural Ontario is now somehow overrepresented in Parliament and must give up a seat to accommodate the suburban-urban south.

The impacts on the right of rural residents to representation will be immense. Our ridings are already massive in area. My riding is bigger than France. These immense ridings have populations that are comparable or larger than many rural regions in Canada. My riding is the same size as or is larger than 44 other ridings in the country, yet I am told that I don't have enough people in my riding to deserve representation.

The issue we're concerned about is that removing the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing is going to have a domino effect on already untenably large ridings that are difficult to represent. Our region of northeastern Ontario, with a population that is rural, indigenous and Franco-Ontarian, will never be able to keep up with the huge population growth expected in the coming years in southern Ontario. If we accept the premise of this change, it means that in future years our regions will have to give up more seats in order to accommodate the expected growth.

In the first round, the boundaries commission stated its intention to create the riding of Kiiwetinoong—Mushkegowuk. An arbitrary line on the map created a riding so massive that you could fit 100 other Ontario seats into it. This was obviously a ridiculous proposition.

It was fair to expect that in the second round the commission would come up with minor changes and respond to feedback. The problem was that they ignored consensus from across the region and presented, in the second round, equally dramatic and arbitrary new boundary lines, which are now threatening to break apart many of the regions and communities that have been together culturally, economically and socially for decades.

In my riding, for example, the commission ignored suggestions on how to increase population, and in the second round, arbitrarily moved the line 130 kilometres north of where it is now. That cuts the francophone region of Temiskaming in half and moves numerous communities out of their traditional centre. There was no consultation, and now there is no ability for those communities to speak, because this was done in the second round.

The commissioners ignored their obligation as laid out in paragraph 15(1)(b), which states that several factors must be considered:

(i) the community of interest or community of identity in or the historical pattern of an electoral district in the province, and

(ii) a manageable geographic size for districts in sparsely populated, rural or northern regions of the province.

They also have, under subsection 15(2), the right to depart from population parity “in order to maintain a manageable geographic size for districts in sparsely populated, rural or northern regions of the province”.

We already suffer from a high level of political alienation in northern Ontario. We are in a very fragile time for democracy. We must do our best to reassure citizens that their voice counts and that they are being heard.

This is why I recommend, along with my colleagues, the status quo for the communities and electors in northern Ontario.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you.

Mr. Sheehan, you are next.

[Terry Sheehan, Liberal, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks to the committee for allowing me to present an argument in favour of fair and equitable representation in northern Ontario.

As committee members are aware, the act permits the commission to consider the relative geographical size of the districts, particularly for remote communities, allowing for “effective representation”. This has been upheld in the Saskatchewan reference regarding provincial electoral boundaries.

This was respected when drawing up some of the ridings in northern Ontario, but not the new riding of Sault Ste. Marie—Algoma. Variances from the quota range from 10% below in Parry Sound—Muskoka to as much as 47% quota in the new Kenora riding that has been proposed. The new riding of Sault Ste. Marie—Algoma is only 2.4% below the variance, but the riding is much bigger than many.

By population, the proposed changes to the Sault Ste. Marie—Algoma riding will have populations comparable to many in the south, but by geography it is much larger. In fact, it must be acknowledged that at least nine of the proposed ridings in the city of Toronto and another four in the GTA have populations that are actually smaller than that of the proposed new Sault Ste. Marie—Algoma riding.

For the three ridings in northwestern Ontario, the commission declared “special circumstances” that allowed them to exceed the 25% variance, mostly leaving the region unchanged from existing boundaries. However, they ignored the same logic when drawing boundaries for the northeast, creating ridings that were large in both population and geography. These special circumstances should have been applied across northern Ontario.

In creating their revised recommendations, the commission acknowledged and pointed out in their original proposal that for the member for Kenora—Thunder Bay—Rainy—and I'll quote right out of the report—“the travel time would be substantial: a Member of Parliament would need to travel over 1,000 km to drive the Highway 11 and Highway 17 circuit from Thunder Bay to Rainy River...and back to Thunder Bay.”

However, in the new proposed Sault Ste. Marie—Algoma riding, to do the exact same thing the commission has proposed, it would be 1,300 kilometres to drive to serve the same area. Meanwhile, in a place like Toronto—Danforth, which has a much smaller population than the new proposal, it takes 10 minutes to drive across it. Again, this is completely flawed logic that the commission has placed in the final proposal.

It's clear that when designing this, the commission did not use for these communities any of the latitude afforded to it for remote and geographic areas. In principle, I strongly believe that northern Ontario should maintain its current 10 members, preferably in adhering to the existing boundaries. As has been mentioned, we are 90% of the geography of Ontario with about 6% to 8% of the population. Regarding communities of interest, this certainly affects rural and remote areas and indigenous and francophone communities.

Failing that, I would prefer that the commission take another look at the region to make its vast remote regions more manageable. They need to acknowledge that special circumstances exist throughout the north, and they need to consult accordingly. On their final proposal, they did not consult any of the communities that have been affected, and that's wrong. It's flawed right from the get-go.

Again, status quo, based upon their logic for half of northern Ontario, should be applied to all of northern Ontario.

Thank you very much. I appreciate this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you very much. We appreciate it as well.

Now we will go to Monsieur Serré.

[Marc Serré, Liberal, Nickel Belt, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I thank the committee members for listening to us today.

As was mentioned, it is very difficult to go from 10 to nine ridings in northern Ontario. In the document, you can see northeastern Ontario on the map. It is not northwestern Ontario; there is a difference. I agree with everything that has been said so far.

I would like to start on a positive note. Concerning Nickel Belt, the commission listened to the people in the Gogama community, for example. They had sent letters asking that this small community remain in Nickel Belt. In addition, in the redistribution, the four municipalities in Sudbury East whose mayors had requested that they remain in Nickel Belt. That's in the submission letter. So those are positive things.

Today I will present three items, which are detailed in the document you received.

First, the Nickel Belt constituency, which was founded in 1952, included the Nickel Centre communities of Wanup, Wahnapitae, Coniston, Garson, Falconbridge and Skead. Essentially, these are rural areas. Last summer, the commission saw fit to attach these rural communities to downtown Sudbury, and that is still what the commission's report says. Once again, the rural area is being mixed with the urban area. I have received letters from city councillors Deb McIntosh and Mike Jakubo, as well as from the new city councillor Natalie Labbée. They all said they wanted these rural communities to remain in Nickel Belt, which is more of a rural riding, rather than being put with the downtown.

An argument was also made that communities of interest and the francophone community should be considered. Under the current proposal, Nickel Belt would go from being 35% francophone to 31%. This is better than last summer's proposal, which would have reduced the percentage to 25%. So the commission was listening, but it didn't do enough to keep the 10 ridings.

I have no objection to adding Espanola and Manitoulin Island to Nickel Belt. The population going from 100,000 to 114,000 is not an issue.

The second point I want to make is about the name of the riding.

Nickel Belt has been the riding name since 1952. It's been 72 years. The riding has changed, so the proposal here is to make Sudbury East Manitoulin—Nickel Belt. It's supported by the Sudbury east and Manitoulin health units, because it has the same boundaries. The municipalities of Sudbury east and SEMA have a letter in the package indicating that the mayors and councils support the name change to better reflect the community.

The last point on the commission here—and you've all heard this—is that it was really devastating for us in northern Ontario to go from 10 to nine seats. We could get into the disenchantment of voters and the rural aspect. It's devastating for us.

When you look at involving more MPs in the process, the commission had a difficult mandate with one additional seat, but I'm asking PROC to really push back on this, because as indicated earlier by Charlie, the next round in northern Ontario will be eight seats. Because of the population of 116,000, it's totally flawed. As indicated by Terry and Viviane, 90% of the geographic area of Ontario is northern Ontario. You could add more monies to a riding that represents 140,000.... We could add more monies for two staff members, but you can't add more money to get more MPs to represent a large area.

I'll leave it at that, and I'll be very happy to answer questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

We can't wait to ask you questions. Thank you for that.

Mrs. Hughes, welcome.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Thank you for this opportunity to speak.

As you know, I represent the riding of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, but the issue is not about me. It's about my riding and the representation of the people of northern Ontario, as you never know who is going to represent the ridings.

Redistribution of electoral districts should not be a threat to small rural communities in northern Ontario, whose voices could be lost if the redistribution exercise rather focuses on population growth. Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing has also experienced population growth, as has northern Ontario as a whole, although not as rapidly as the more populous southern Ontario.

I remember when Jack Layton came to my riding in northern Ontario, he was impressed with the size of the territory. He said that he could cycle from one end of his riding to the other in half an hour.

This goes to show how vast northern Ontario is. It accounts for 88% of the province's land mass. Yet, under the current proposal, northern Ontario would account for just over 7% of Ontario's electoral districts. This is a significant disparity in geographic representation.

I also want to remind you that the Supreme Court previously ruled in the 1991 Carter decision that Canadian democracy is rooted in the ability for citizens to be effectively represented, with Justice McLachlin stating “Effective representation and good government in this country compel that factors other than voter parity, such as geography and community interests, be taken into account in setting electoral boundaries.”

These are all principles laid out in the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act. However, I believe that the commission has not placed enough focus on geography and communities of interest when finalizing its report.

Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing comprises a vast geography, encompassing many communities of interest, including distinct francophone communities, many first nations and a diverse collection of small towns and rural communities. To give you an idea, the riding has 40 municipalities, some of which are composed of multiple towns; 17 first nations; a number of unorganized townships, such as Sultan, Foleyet, Willisville, Whitefish Falls, Hawk Junction and more

Is there an issue?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

There's no issue. If you can, just slow down a bit.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

I provided my presentation in both official languages. I'm sorry about that.

In northern Ontario, communities often lack the infrastructure that is available to people in other regions of the province, including access to Service Canada and other governmental offices and agencies, unlike what they have in southern Ontario; high-speed Internet and cellular services; and public transportation.

Reducing the number of electoral districts would be detrimental to those citizens. I am concerned that the current proposal to eliminate Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing as an electoral district will disenfranchise people from the electoral process, as well as the recruitment—as mentioned by my colleague from Sudbury—of potential candidates for office, especially women or young people.

I should also note that the final proposal from the electoral boundaries commission of Ontario, while based on some of the feedback received during the consultation period as it related to the initial report, differs greatly from its initial proposal and has not received public feedback. To make such sweeping changes to even the initial proposal without giving citizens the opportunity to voice their concerns is concerning.

As I close my initial remarks, I urge this committee to reconsider the drastic changes in northern Ontario. If we look at Brampton, for example, they're putting in a sixth MP. We're talking about 265 square kilometres, and there are currently five MPPs as well who represent that area. They have a lot more resources. I'm not saying they shouldn't have more representation. What I'm saying is it's not equitable compared to what we have to travel in northern Ontario and represent.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Thank you for that.

I acknowledge that you were all really good to provide your comments to interpreters beforehand. They still need to read it into the record. That's where the disconnect sometimes happens. I was listening to the French. It's a long title. Kapuskasing just isn't something that people say all the time. Maybe we should say it more often.

With that, we're going into six-minute rounds. We'll start with Ms. Gladu.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for being here today.

I have a little procedural thing before we start. I noticed that Monsieur Serré's submission was submitted on March 10, and Mr. Garneau has signed it, but he stepped down as MP on March 8. Do we have to have a unanimous consent motion or anything to consider it? I'm sure he could get a signature from any one of us here. I don't know if that's a deal or not, Chair. Okay. That's fine.

Let me go into my questions. I'll start off with Monsieur Serré.

There are a number of places within your riding—Garson, Falconbridge, Skead, etc.—that you mentioned are going to be impacted. Are these separate municipalities? Who do they pay taxes to?

[Marc Serré, Liberal, Nickel Belt, ON]

Thanks for the clarification and the question.

The city of Sudbury was amalgamated 22 years ago. There were seven municipalities. Now there's one municipality and there are 12 wards. These areas are now wards. Basically, there are 12 wards. I have six wards, Viviane has six wards and we have one mayor.

That area we're talking about, Coniston, had its own council. Now it has two councillors, who I cited in the report.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Angus, you talked about the growth rate of northern Ontario not keeping up with that of the rest of the province. I know we heard that the GTA is growing at 6%, and the rest of Ontario is at 13%. What's the growth rate in northern Ontario?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I think we've been growing at just above 2%; however, in the last few years, we've seen a significant increase. We were stopped a bit by COVID, but there has been, in particular, South Asian immigration and francophone immigration from Africa. There's been a big promotion to maintain a balance between English-speaking and francophone people.

All of our communities now, since the last census, have seen huge transformations in terms of multicultural presence. All of those communities are growing, particularly the larger ones. Some of that is not reflected in the statistics, but there's no way those communities will ever.... Kirkland Lake will simply never be able to grow as fast as Mississauga.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

One thing I noted was that all of you in the north did a great job at the beginning of looking for the status quo and sending letters, and a lot of your communities sent letters. However, the commission didn't seem to listen to that with the redraw. What new information are you bringing forward that you think will convince them?

We'll go one at a time, from Charlie over to Viviane.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

When they came to Timmins, the commission came up to me and asked if I had suggestions. I knew they were looking to increase our population. As I said, 44 other ridings have a smaller population than mine. I offered them, for example, the Temiskaming Shores region, which would add 13,000 people. I offered to take in the Ring of Fire region, which is extremely isolated, but we already represent some of those communities.

I was shocked that the whole agricultural district was taken apart and moved, and we had no involvement in that. Nobody was aware of that. They'd asked for suggestions on how we'd work with them, and we gave them suggestions, again based on communities of interest, particularly on the francophone and agricultural sectors that are growing on Highway 11. Then we get this back and we were told this is the final plan.

I have to go back to the farm communities now and say, “Guess what, Matheson, Val Gagné and Cochrane. You're all connected to Temiskaming, but you guys are now in different electoral districts.” They'll say, “Where did that come from?”

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Go ahead, Mrs. Hughes.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

As you saw, a lot of our arguments are similar, because it's a huge riding. These are huge ridings. The demographics are there. As I've indicated as well, we weren't against certain changes. Foleyet could easily go into the Timmins area.

We can't make up population. We have been growing in the north by approximately 2.8%. Also, the number of consultations didn't really allow for these communities to participate. There was one in Timmins. There was nothing in my riding at all. There was one in Thunder Bay, and one in.... There wasn't even one in Sudbury, which is the largest community.

I think certainly the process is there. I know they were really looking to see how best to do this, but their focus from the beginning was to remove that seat from northern Ontario. Also, as mentioned by Mr. Sheehan, what was applied in one area wasn't really applied in this area here, so we need to rethink how we do these ridings.

I know there might be some legislative processes that we would need to do in the future, but the commission does have a responsibility to ensure that these communities have the representation they need and deserve based on factors other than population.

I just want to add as well that the commission in this round has basically taken Sagamok away from Massey. Massey and Webbwood are communities in the township of Sables-Spanish Rivers, and to get to Sagamok you cross the bridge. It's just a bridge that divides them, so you can't really split them up and take them away. I understand the commission's thought of trying to put all the indigenous communities from that tribal council together, but it doesn't make sense to split up those communities.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

I'm out of time, but I'll get to the rest of you in the next round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

Excellent. Thank you so much, and as someone who occupies the Speaker's chair every so often, perhaps you'll remember this courtesy, Mrs. Hughes, the next time.