Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Chairman, that is a matter for the commissioner, not for the Chief Electoral Officer.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The commissioner does not report to me. The commissioner decides whether to lay charges or whether there's been an infraction about signing an agreement or whether there's a need to amend the report that has been produced. These are decisions that can flow from his investigation

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Well, if there's a charge before the courts, that becomes public. If there is an amended report, that becomes public. It's posted on our website as well.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes. Would you like me to elaborate, sir?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The equipment we have in the field is what I'm talking about. There are over 3,000 computers in the field. The supplier contract with IBM Canada is coming to an end. They keep the equipment up to date. This equipment is now finished. Its usefulness has come to an end. They're no

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's software as well. We're going to an Internet-based approach, as opposed to the system we have now.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The contract with IBM is clear; we check this regularly with IBM. They will keep alive what we have now until that date so there's a seamless switchover.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'm expecting a report on this presently to see exactly what the advantages would be, because we are thinking of doing that as well. As soon as I have a reply, I could inform this committee, either through an appearance or through correspondence or both, Mr. Chairman.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It is fundamentally a good idea.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I have two numbers to give to this committee. It's approximately $150,000 to replicate all of the related documents, and to replicate them everywhere on the website, when there are a number of name changes to ridings. On top of that, if the name change involves more than 50 chara

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I will provide them.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'd be more than pleased to do that.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think it's very important to have every possible elector on the list of electors. How that is achieved is very important as well. What I've told the committee before, and through the statistics we provide, is that some 94% to 95% of the people are on the lists that we provide.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The last time we did door-to-door was 1997, and that's how we established the register; it started from there. But perhaps I can answer further by saying that in my view it would be worthwhile, if there were an opportunity to check, perhaps at the same time as we do the census

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's called being ahead of the game.