Procedure and House Affairs committee  Actually, what they do say is that administrative mistakes are not a reason to deny someone the right to vote. They say that it cannot be a perfect system and that small errors like record-keeping errors, such as in the vouching and registration certificates, are not reason enoug

Procedure and House Affairs committee  What the majority decision says, which is asserted by four of the seven justices, is that if there's an irregularity that affects the result of the election, those votes will not be counted. However, the important part of their decision is that not every error counts as an irregu

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That's not what the Supreme Court said in the majority opinion. They said that only certain kinds of irregularities count and the kinds of errors that occurred in the Etobicoke Centre case did not arise to the level of an irregularity. You'll see this, for example, in paragraph

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The Supreme Court would not agree with that, though. The Supreme Court said that certain errors with respect to vouching do not arise to a level of an irregularity. Mr. Neufeld, in his report, lumped together a lot of different vouching problems that the Supreme Court, in its dec

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Probably this is the first time ever that professors have agreed on anything, so this is really quite remarkable. We spend most of our time arguing about everything and not agreeing on anything. Having such widespread agreement with over 170—I think the number is now 179—professo

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think it's essential that the legislation be amended. There's also Canada's international reputation to consider, the fact that we are a leader globally for electoral standards. This bill seriously undermines our international standards. I think if it does not get amended, it s

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think I speak for everyone who signed it when I say that we believe that significant revisions must be made to this bill. It's problematic in a number of different ways. This is from a non-partisan standpoint of expertise. It's not a partisan position. It's based on best practi

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's interesting. Professor Hasen actually believes the voting wars have now come to Canada, now that he has taken a look at the fair elections act. He's of the view that the same sort of dynamic is happening here, where requirements for voter ID are actually leading to vote supp

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think it's essential that Elections Canada has the ability to make sure the political parties are actually providing evidence about their election expenses, given the fact that $33 million is returned to political parties. I can't imagine in any other setting that you ask for r

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think this seriously hampers the ability of Elections Canada to actually investigate effectively any kind of electoral infractions. Without this ability, which other organizations such as the Competition Bureau do have, it makes it very difficult for Elections Canada to actuall

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, and good evening. My name is Yasmin Dawood and I'm an assistant professor of law at the University of Toronto. My areas of specialty are election law and constitutional law. Two weeks ago my colleagues and I wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Harper an