Procedure and House Affairs committee  I also think of palliative care situations as being another possibility. I wanted to ask this as well. The VIC, the voter information card, I don't know how often it is actually available to people who are in institutional settings. I got the impression from the Chief Electoral Officer's testimony that there are occasions on which those who administered the institutions are reluctant to provide the information that would provide for accurate accounting of who is there.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I just remind everybody that the Chief Electoral Officer spoke to how comparatively accurate the voter information cards are in terms of their being the most accurate piece of federal ID that exists and said that the fact that some people aren't on the register doesn't make them less accurate for those who receive them.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  We've heard quite a bit about that tonight. Bill C-23's proposal to eliminate vouching and prohibit the use of voter information cards, VIC, for verifying a voter's residence will disenfranchise voters who do not have full identification of their address. Persons with disabilities living in long-term care facilities and homeless people with disabilities will be among the disenfranchised because they experience barriers to obtaining necessary ID, not because it's not available, but they just can't get it.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I recommend that the exemption for the cost of fundraising communications be dropped from the bill. Turning to voter information cards and vouching, the proposal to eliminate VICs and vouching is wrong. No hard evidence of voter fraud has been presented. There are already controls on the use of these devices and more safeguards could be introduced if this were deemed to be necessary.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  We do know from the CEO's report on lack of youth participation, that when young voters—he divided the young people into five groups—cited reasons why they hadn't participated, three of the groups—and I can't remember which of the three subcategories it was—indicated that one of the primary reasons was lack of voter information materials, voter information cards, which among other things tell you where to vote. It does serve as a prompt. Many people carry these things into the poll. I did; it was a helpful reminder of here's where and when the advanced poll is, that kind of thing.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  In your opinion, what will be the effect—on electoral participation particularly—of the fact that we will be abolishing both the use of vouchers and the use of the voter information card, which until now allowed people to vote on election day?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Simms brought the example forward of a woman in a care facility in his home province, in his riding actually, who he stated would not have been able to vote without the voter information card, because he said it was the only possible piece of identification that showed where she lived. I point out that's absolutely false, because contained in the act is the ability for seniors who live in care facilities to merely get an attestation from the head of the facility, saying, “This woman lives here.”

Procedure and House Affairs committee  So the comments that I made that, not that colleague, but his partner across the floor tried to impugn just now in the House of Commons saying that what I said was clearly not true, voter information cards were allowed and used in 2006.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Voter information cards were a piece of information to tell voters when they could vote and where they could vote.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Because voter information cards were not allowed as a singular form of ID in 2006—and I'm representing 2006 and I'll have more to say about that when I'm in your seat next week—and multiple vouching was not allowed in 2006—

Procedure and House Affairs committee  If they're a regular voter and they weren't allowed in the last election to use their voter information card as address ID, they're scrambling around, emptying their wallet, and trying to figure out how they're going to get a ballot. Their driver's licence, which they thought was going to be enough, isn't working because it has a post office box on it.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  And possibly even a larger number if the voter information card is no longer allowed in any form as ID.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  There's a tension there, but what I find is that there's no improvement as a result of Bill C-23's elimination of vouching and the elimination of the voter information card as a form of address ID. There's nothing in it that improves integrity, but what it does is that it very seriously and negatively affects accessibility and, I would say, disenfranchises voters.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's true, I think, from your testimony and your report, and I just want to confirm it, that you did not recommend eliminating vouching. You also recommended an expanded use of voter information cards.

Privilege  The first fact that was omitted from the submission, and the wording was used very carefully, was that cards like this were not used by Elections Canada for identification at the time, the implication being that there were no such cards. However, there were voter information cards sent out by Elections Canada to electors at that time. They did receive them. Hence the phone call that the hon. member received. Having been Minister for Democratic Reform in the period after 2006, I can say that the reason Elections Canada can say with certainty that they were not authorized for use as identification is that we had not yet passed into law the requirement for people to show identification when they voted, so of course they were not used for a provision that did not yet exist in the law.