Bill C-16 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act

This enactment amends the Canada Elections Act to provide that, subject to an earlier dissolution of Parliament, a general election must be held on the third Monday in October in the fourth calendar year following polling day for the last general election, with the first general election after this enactment comes into force being held on Monday, October 19, 2009.
The enactment also provides that the Chief Electoral Officer may recommend an alternate day if the day set for polling is not suitable.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Ladies and gentlemen, we'll begin the meeting.

Members, I want to remind you that today we are having a video conference from Vancouver, British Columbia. Because of that, I have been asked to advise members that we need to speak a little more slowly and perhaps a little more clearly than we are used to doing at some of our other meetings. Thank you for that.

I want to remind members as well that this meeting is being held in public. We will start with a brief introduction from our guest this morning, followed by five-minute rounds of questioning. We will continue to do those rounds in the usual format with the official opposition, the Liberals, then the Conservative Party, the Bloc, and the NDP, and then begin the second round.

The purpose of this meeting is to continue our consideration of Bill C-16, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act for fixed election dates.

Our witness this morning is Ms. Linda Johnson, Deputy Chief Electoral Officer for the Province of British Columbia. As members know, Ms. Johnson was asked to present for this committee as British Columbia is the only province to have gone through the entire process under the fixed election date format.

We certainly appreciate very much your appearance this morning, Ms. Johnson. We all realize that you had to get up a lot earlier than we did for this meeting, and we appreciate that very much.

I will turn the meeting over to you now for your statement, for whatever you would like to say to the committee, and then we will open for questions.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Do you want me to ask on bended knees, Mr. Chairman?

Mr. Kingsley, you were supposed to give us an answer about page 32 of our report aimed at improving the integrity of the electoral process. We wanted to know if the practice of bingo cards was allowed under the Elections Act of Canada. I would like to know when you will give us that answer and how.

If you decide that it's allowed, will there have to be an amendment to the legislation or only an administrative amendment? That question is addressed to you.

I want to come back to the question I put to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons. The government is supposed to answer the report we tabled in June before October 20. Does the government intend to answer before October 20? If so, will that answer include changes to the legislation which are not included in Bill C-16? The aim of Bill C-16 is to implement fixed election dates. However, if we wanted to improve other aspects of the elections process, would there have to be another Bill?

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

I want to ask more questions, Mr. Chairman, but not necessarily to Mr. Kingsley. Let's see if we have a good Parliamentary secretary, able to answer our questions, because I want to question him about the report. You may say that this is not directly related to Bill C-16 but, if we have to amend the Act, it's important to know when the changes will happen.

I could come back for the next round.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

How did it go with Bill C-16?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley, Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon, everyone. I'm accompanied today by Mrs. Diane Davidson, deputy chief electoral officer and chief legal counsel; and Mr. Rennie Molnar, senior director of operations, register, and geography.

Members of the committee may recall that when I appeared on June 13 of this year I expressed my agreement with the idea of fixed-date elections. The proposed legislation would facilitate many aspects of Elections Canada's planning and operations. On June 13, I submitted a written summary of those benefits, and I have brought copies of that document for you today. I understand they've been recirculated.

I will comment on some aspects of the proposed legislation from the perspective of electoral administration, which the committee may wish to consider. As it stands now, my office plans for general elections incrementally through the setting of regular readiness dates throughout the election cycle. The frequency of these dates is necessarily greater in minority government situations. The moment there is a majority government in power, elections on a date set by statute would enable Elections Canada to plan more securely in four-year cycles, with contingencies for delivering general elections that could still occur outside the fixed date.

There are a number of operational benefits associated with fixed election dates. For example, at the issue of the writ, returning offices could be up and running with communications technology installed and staff hired and trained. This is not small. This would allow for better service to electors, and a fixed date would also allow my office a greater advance opportunity to identify and secure locations for polling stations. This would include firm commitments for access to sites that are accessible, thus resulting in improved locations and greater convenience for electors.

Knowing the date of the election in advance would also permit targeted updates of the national register of electors, done in close consultation with members of Parliament, political parties, and electoral district associations, to be performed in the month leading up to the writ being issued. It is not automatic that we would do this, but it's a possibility. This would result in a more up-to-date preliminary list of electors for candidates at the start of the election and fewer revisions to the list during the electoral period.

Holding elections at a fixed date would also be beneficial for our outreach and education programs, as well as for our advertising, which could be implemented more effectively before and during general elections. From an operational point of view, the fall--particularly the month of October--is a good time of year to have an election. It may well be the best.

It should be noted however that should the polling date fall on the third Monday of October as proposed, this would result in the advanced polls falling on the long Thanksgiving weekend.

From 2000 to 2006, turnout at advanced polls has more than doubled, from 775,000 voters to 1,600,000. This means that such a decision would probably have a real impact.

Subsection 56.2(1) of Bill C-16 provides that the Chief Electoral Officer may, if he thinks that the polling date is not suitable, including by reason of its being in conflict with a day of cultural or religious significance or a provincial or municipal election, choose another day to recommend to the Governor in Council. Should the recommendation be accepted, the Governor in Council would have to make an order to that effect before August 1st in the year in which the general election is to be held. You're all well aware of this provision.

Currently, the Chief Electoral Officer does not have such discretion. The authority to recommend an alternate polling day could rest with Parliament directly. Further, if the date of the election has to shift beyond a Tuesday, it would be preferable to have it moved to the next day rather than the following Monday as currently proposed.

I would like to add a few words on the current advertising practices. Treasury Board already imposes a ban on certain types of government advertising during the election period. To quote from the Government of Canada Communications Policy:

Advertising is only permitted when: an institution is required by statute or regulation to issue a public notice for legal purposes; an institution must inform the public of a danger to health, safety or the environment; or an institution must post an employment or staffing notice.

The committee may wish to consider expanding the timing of this ban to four weeks before the issuance of the writ of election. It might be deemed appropriate as well to subject political parties to this restriction.

To conclude, the proposed legislation would improve our service to electors, candidates, political parties and other stakeholders.

My officials and myself will be pleased to answer your questions.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our guests.

I will just state for the record that as a party we support this. In fact, it was part of the ethics package of my predecessor, Mr. Broadbent. We're still looking for a couple of other things, such as floor crossing, and in fact the whole idea of real democratic reform and proportional representation, but we'll save that for another day.

Let's turn to Bill C-16. There's a paper attached to my package from the Library of Parliament about the history of the private members' bills vis-à-vis fixed election dates. It provides some interesting ideas, and one of them in fact is from our very own Prime Minister. I guess this dilemma we have is whether we are going to deal with the C word--not wanting to open up the Constitution. I think most people would concur that it probably wouldn't be helpful to open up the Constitution to get this done. But I think if you take a look at Mr. Rowland's private member's bill in 1970, the concerns that have been presented before us are addressed.

I'm wanting this to go through, and I'm supporting the bill, but do we actually believe there is a point where we will deal with the constitutional reform? Does that need to be done in the future? If we do this, at some point could we take a look at that? Would it be possible? I'll leave that to you.

The second thing I would ask is how this affects the government's plans for Senate reform.

Third, please explain to us...because I don't think this should be called fixed election dates, they are flexible fixed election dates. Mr. Milner provided that language. I think it's important that we say that, because it confuses the electorate. They think, oh, no matter what, we'll have these fixed dates. That will undermine the idea of the minority Parliament.

My last point is that citizens should understand that you won't have a campaign for four years, that there will be some boundaries around when you're allowed to start campaigning. Perhaps you can give us some insight into that, because I think a lot of people are quite rightly concerned that we'll have campaigns going on forever--and no one, not even us, would like that.

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Mr. Minister, Bill C-16 sets the elections on the third Monday in October every four years, commencing in 2009. You stated in your remarks that the time will not conflict with any holidays or anything they can call then. I find it very appropriate that you stated that National Citizenship Week is the third week in October, and I think that's a great time to have elections.

You did then go into a little bit about how Thanksgiving might conflict with the advance polls. Can I first of all have your assurances that there are no conflicts with the part about the third Monday? Then could you talk a little bit more about how we think Thanksgiving may conflict in some of the years when Thanksgiving is that late in the year?

[Rob Nicholson, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

With me are Warren Newman, who is general counsel for constitutional and administrative law; Kathy O'Hara, deputy secretary to the cabinet, machinery of government; and Dan McDougall, director of operations, legislation and House planning.

Good morning, colleagues. I'm very pleased to appear before your committee to talk about Bill C-16 relating to fixed election dates. I will begin by describing the present system for calling general elections and I will mention some of the difficulties it creates.

I also want to talk about why the government chose to draft the bill the way it did, and why the route we took was both necessary and effective.

Finally, I would be happy to respond to any questions.

Today, as you know, it is the prerogative of the Prime Minister whose government has not lost the confidence in the House of Commons to select what he or she regards as a propitious time for an election to renew the government's mandate. The Prime Minister then requests dissolution of the House from the Governor General, and if the Governor General agrees, he or she proclaims the date of the election.

What we have is a situation where the Prime Minister is able to choose the date of the general election--not necessarily what is in the best interests of the country, but conceivably what is in the best interests of his or her party. Bill C-16 will address this situation and produce a number of other benefits.

As set out in the government's platform, this bill is modelled after existing provincial fixed-date elections legislation. The legislation is similar to the approach used by British Columbia, Ontario, and Newfoundland and Labrador. British Columbia just had its first fixed-date election on May 17, 2005. Ontario, and Newfoundland and Labrador, will soon have their fixed-date elections October 4, 2007, and October 9, 2007 respectively.

In British Columbia, there was certainly no evidence of what some critics have called a lame-duck government, and certainly no evidence that the legislation was in some way illusory or ineffective.

The government's bill provides that the date for the next general election will be Monday, October 19, 2009. Of course, this will be the date only if the government is able to retain the confidence of the House until that time. This bill does not affect the powers of the Governor General to call an election sooner if a government loses the confidence of the House. For example, if the government were to be defeated tomorrow, a general election would be held according to normal practice; however, the subsequent election would be scheduled for the third Monday in October in the fourth calendar year after the next election. That is the normal model that would be established by this bill. General elections would occur on the third Monday of October in the fourth calendar year following the previous general election.

We chose the third Monday in October because it was the date that was likely to maximize voter turnout and the least likely to conflict with cultural or religious holidays or elections in other jurisdictions. This raises an additional feature of the bill that I want to bring to your attention, which provides for an alternate election date in the event of a conflict with a date of religious or cultural significance, or an election in another jurisdiction.

In the current system, the date of the general election is chosen by the government, so it is rare that a polling date is chosen that comes into conflict with a date of cultural or religious significance, or with elections in other jurisdictions. However, with the introduction of legislation providing for fixed-date elections, there is some possibility that in the future the stipulated election date will occasionally be the same as a day of cultural or religious significance, or an election in another jurisdiction.

The Ontario fixed-date elections legislation provides that if there is a conflict with a day of cultural or religious significance, the Chief Elections Officer may recommend an alternative polling date to the Lieutenant Governor in Council up to seven days following the date that would otherwise be the polling date.

Using a variation of the Ontario legislation providing for fixed-date elections, our bill empowers the Chief Electoral Officer to recommend an alternate polling day to the Governor in Council should he or she find that the polling date is not suitable for that purpose. The alternate date would be either the Tuesday or the Monday following the Monday that would otherwise be the polling date. Allowing alternate polling days to be held on the following Tuesday or Monday is consistent with the current federal practice of holding elections on a Monday or a Tuesday.

Fixed-date elections will provide numerous benefits to our political system. With fixed-date elections the timing of general elections will be known to all, which will provide for greater fairness. Instead of the governing party having the advantage of determining when the next election will take place and being the single party that may know for up to several months when it will occur, all parties will be on an equal footing.

Another key advantage of fixed-date elections is that this measure will provide transparency as to when general elections will be held. Rather than decisions about election dates being made behind closed doors, general election dates will be public knowledge. I think they will allow for improved governance. For example, fixed-date elections will allow for better parliamentary planning. Members of parliamentary committees will be able to set their agendas well in advance, which will make the work of committees and Parliament as a whole more efficient.

Another reason for adopting fixed-date elections is that this measure will likely improve voter turnout because elections will be held in October, except when a government loses the confidence of the House. The weather is generally favourable in most parts of the country at that time of year, and fewer people are transient. So for example, most students will not be in transition between home and school at that time and will be able to vote. Moreover, seniors will not be deterred from voting, as they might in some of the colder months.

Now, it should be noted that the weekend before the third Monday in October is Thanksgiving weekend. This would be the weekend of advance voting, as advance voting is set in the Canada Elections Act for the tenth, ninth, and seventh days before polling day. That would be the Friday, the Saturday, and the Monday prior to the election date. I believe that having Canadians discussing the general election during part of a Thanksgiving weekend is not a bad thing. And if some Canadians wish to spend a few minutes voting in advance polls that weekend, all the better.

For your information, only 10.5% of those who voted in 2006 voted in the advance polls, while 2.8% voted either at a returning office or by postal ballot. The vast majority of voters, 86.7% in 2006, cast their votes on polling day. So those who would have to staff the advance polls, which are open from noon until 8 p.m. in fewer than 3,000 locations, would be aware of this responsibility before they accepted the position.

Some members have indicated that the bill is illusory in that the Prime Minister can call an election at any point up until the fixed election date. All I can say is that this view does not reflect the way our system of responsible government actually works. The Prime Minister has to retain his or her prerogative to advise dissolution to allow for situations when the government loses the confidence of the House. This is a fundamental principle of our system of responsible government.

It has been suggested that the government should insert a clause into Bill C-16 constraining the Prime Minister's ability to request dissolution of Parliament to certain circumstances. Let me be clear. Including a clause that attempts to constrain the Prime Minister in requesting dissolution of Parliament would, in our view, present a risk, which we should not ignore, that the legislation would be found unconstitutional if challenged in the courts. Why? Under the rules and conventions of responsible government, the Governor General's power to dissolve Parliament has to be exercised on the advice of the Prime Minister. The Governor General's legal power under the Constitution and the exercise of that power on the advice of the Prime Minister are fundamentally and inseparably linked. If one limits the Prime Minister's ability to advise, one risks constraining the Governor General's powers in a way that would be unconstitutional.

An amendment in relation to the powers of the Office of the Governor General would require, of course, the consent of the Houses of Parliament and of the legislative assemblies of all provinces, and I think with respect to this piece of legislation, it is unnecessary and unwanted.

It has also been suggested that governments should insert a clause into Bill C-16 that would define very specifically what constitutes a vote of confidence. This would, it is argued, prevent governments from engineering their own defeat in minority situations. Again, constraining the Prime Minister's power to advise the dissolution of Parliament except in certain circumstances would risk being declared unconstitutional and fettering the Governor General's powers. Moreover, if the bill were to attempt to define confidence or to provide criteria for when confidence is lost, the whole concept of confidence itself would risk becoming justiciable in the courts, something that would run contrary to the fundamental constitutional principle of the separation of powers between the legislative, executive, and judicial branches and the appropriate role of the courts in our constitutional system of parliamentary democracy.

The government has followed the broad approach of British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Ontario, which is an approach that works. If one looks for other examples within the British parliamentary system where fixed-date elections are in place, such as New Zealand, Scotland, and Wales, none of them has provisions like the ones that have been suggested by certain members at second reading.

The government is committed to making this modest but important change to improve Canadian democratic institutions and practices, but this change must be done in a way that is respectful of our Constitution, our great heritage, and the principles of responsible government.

In conclusion, I would like to point out that the third week in October is National Citizenship Week in this country, a time when we celebrate what it means to be a citizen of Canada. It is fitting, then, that the general election date will be set for the third Monday in October--a most fitting and functional expression of our citizenship.

Fixed-date elections will provide for greater fairness, increased transparency and predictability, improved policy planning, and, I believe, increased voter turnout. In June of this past year, Ipsos Reid released the results of a poll that showed 78% of Canadians support government's plans to provide for fixed-date elections. I hope you will join me in voting in favour of this important and widely supported measure.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for coming this morning.

I would like to remind members that this meeting will be held in public today, so please remember that.

The purpose of the meeting today is to begin our discussions on Bill C-16, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act. We have a lot of ground to cover today, so I ask for the committee's diligence. We've invited the Government House Leader and his officials to appear today at this meeting. As well, we have invited the Chief Electoral Officer to appear following the minister.

I also remind the members that at our business meeting last week we agreed that the questioning rounds would be limited to five minutes. I will be watching and trying to assist committee members in keeping their questions short so that we can actually leave ample time for answers from the witnesses, as that, of course, is the point. As usual, our round of questioning will begin with the Liberals, then the Conservative Party, then the Bloc and the NDP, each having five minutes. We will certainly keep track, or try our very best to keep track, of members who have put up their hands. Please make sure you leave your hands up until either the clerk or I see you. That way we won't miss anyone at all.

The only other thing I want to mention is that we have divided the time. If necessary, the minister will have the first hour, if in fact that is needed, and be followed by Mr. Kingsley, who will take up the balance of time if that much time is necessary.

Finally, I'm going to ask for five minutes of committee time at the end to discuss future business.

That just gives you an idea of how I would like to conduct the business of the meeting today.

Without any further ado, I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome the Honourable Rob Nicholson. I appreciate your taking the time on such short notice.

As members know, Mr. Nicholson is the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister Responsible for Democratic Reform. He is also, of course, the sponsor of Bill C-16. Minister, I thank you very much for taking time out of your busy schedule to appear before the committee today to discuss Bill C-16. I would like to ask you to start by introducing your team. Then, by all means, go on with your opening statement, and we'll follow that with questions.

Canada Elections Act

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak here today regarding Bill C-16, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act.

I would first like to comment on the response given by the hon. member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord to the hon. member for Victoria.

The member said that when Quebec left and part of Canada was taken away it would not hurt British Columbia or any part of Canada. I disagree. I refer to the great English parliamentarian, John Donne, who said that when just one clod of earth washed away from the shores of England, when one was lost, it affected the entire country. When we lose one person, for whom does the bell toll? It tolls for thee. Losing any part of Canada would have a great effect on all of Canada. It is a subject of great concern and importance to everyone.

Turning to the bill, most of the discussion so far has been on the philosophical aspects of the bill, but I want to talk about three technical aspects of it. The drafters and departmental officials may want to consider some technical points.

I want to talk about proposed subsection 56.2(1). This refers to changing the fixed election date slightly if there is a provincial or municipal election. The government philosophy that it does not want to conflict with other governments' elections is good. It could be a nightmare if two elections were going on at the same time.

Unfortunately, this section is very flawed, because it refers only to municipal and provincial governments. Canada is not made up simply of provincial and municipal governments. There are four orders of government in Canada and the federal government has neglected two of them: the territorial and the first nations governments. It was only a few parliamentary days ago when we had a vote in the House of Commons and only two of us, the member for Nunavut and I, voted against it because it referred to federal and provincial governments but had left out the territorial governments. Here again the territories have been left out.

If we characterize the current government since the election, it has been a government of omission: who has been left out; who has been left behind. Think about the low income people whose taxes were increased, as mentioned previously. Think about people with disabilities and seniors whose income tax increased from 12% to 12.5%. Global warming is having a dramatic effect on the people in the north while many of the climate change programs have been allowed to expire and are not being renewed. The aboriginal people were also left behind when the greatest agreement in the history of this nation, with funding of $5 billion, was abrogated. It was a good faith agreement and those people were left behind. Single mothers have lost the $5 billion day care program which would have given them some relief, some possibility of getting into the workforce and building new lives for themselves.

We are leaving behind geographically almost half the country: the territorial governments and the first nations governments. I want to talk about first nations governments. This is only the tip of the iceberg. Unfortunately, federal departments, agencies and politicians too often do not realize the new reality in Canada, the great land claims and self-government agreements. I am sure every member in the House is in total agreement with the modernization of dealing with these other governments in Canada. Too often we forget that we have made these arrangements.

When we sign deals with first nations, we have created new governments in Canada that in some cases have more power than a province. These governments have to be legally and morally dealt with on a government to government to government basis. We cannot just omit them when we are talking about governments in this country. We have signed deals that mandate consultation. We have signed agreements that are constitutionally protected in some cases that mandate consultation with these governments. Sometimes people do not understand and they think it is only the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, but it is all federal departments and agencies and it is all politicians. We have signed these agreements on behalf of Canada and not on behalf of a single department.

I would certainly be looking for a technical modification to proposed subsection 56.2(1) to include governments that are omitted in the present drafting.

The only other major point I want to make relates to proposed subsection 56.2(4). My colleague from Nipissing—Timiskaming made the same point. As I have said earlier, this is in relation to not having elections at the same time.

If Bill C-16 were to come into effect in its present form, the federal election would occur three days before all the municipal elections in my jurisdiction. Any member who has had the unfortunate situation of having two elections going on at the same time knows what a mess it is. When enumerators go door to door, people say that they have already been enumerated. There are signs of all different colours for different elections. The voters do not know which advance poll is for which election. It is absurd to have two elections going on at the same time. If possible, it should be avoided.

The bill will mandate that two elections go on within three days of each other in 2007. Some technical modifications are needed. I know the government is acting in goodwill. The government does not want to pile up elections. This was part of the government's philosophy in bringing forward the bill. Unfortunately, the technical aspects of the bill do not make that possible now.

The bill allows for small changes in timing, but only three days. It could be the day after or a week after, which in effect would only be three days from the election that I am talking about.

We need more flexibility in that section, perhaps a month, so that the Governor General has enough flexibility and that provincial, municipal, first nations or other government elections do not overlap. As the NDP member from Ottawa said earlier, when there are conflicting situations what happens is that the electorate stops showing up. There is already a big enough problem with that. We do not want to create more problems for the electorate which is already having a problem getting enthused with the process.

Proposed subsection 57(4) talks about changing the election day to the Tuesday if the Monday happens to be a holiday. That does not jibe clearly with proposed subsection 56.2(4) which talks about the alternate dates, because it could be the alternate Tuesday or Monday. Technically we must make sure that those two sections work together and that the results are very clear.

In conclusion, there are two major technical flaws with the bill. One is that the bill only talks about two of the four orders of government where the federal election date would be altered. The other is the bill does not have enough flexibility to change the federal election date slightly by a number of weeks, a month or so, in order not to conflict with a provincial, municipal or first nations election.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my honourable and active colleague from the Yukon.

I welcome the opportunity to speak to Bill C-16, legislation that seeks to amend the Canada Elections Act to bring in fixed election dates at the federal level in Canada. The bill provides, subject to an early dissolution of Parliament, that a general election must be held every four years.

The issue of fixed elections is embraced by many people as a way of addressing some of the perceived cynicism in our political system. Rightly or wrongly, people do believe that what happens here in Ottawa is often out of sync with ordinary Canadians. I think we could all think of circumstances. I will vote for the legislation at second reading so the committee can deliberate and make any changes, particularly as it relates to the issue of confidence and confidence votes.

I was not always a fan of fixed elections. In fact, I can recall when I was the president of the Liberal Party in Nova Scotia, my good friend and former leader, Danny Graham, upon becoming leader, proposed sweeping changes on how the government and the House of Assembly operated. He had a large number of democratic reforms about which he was very passionate, including fixed elections.

As party president at the time, I thought there were more important issues to be addressed and I was not at all enthralled with this idea but, as is usually the case when I look back on it, Danny was right. I have come to believe that fixed elections do have useful elements and are worthy of support. I think they are generally good for government. I think they are generally good for the public service. I think they are generally good for the media who have to cover and portray campaigns at their cost. And I think they are generally good for Canadians.

One of the primary arguments for fixed elections is to remove the unfair advantage that the government has in setting the election date. Does this take politics out of the election dates? I do not think it takes all of the politics out of election dates. It does mean that the government cannot determine in a majority situation that it will have an election early or even go for five years if it wishes. It does determine that the date will be held at a certain point in time, but it certainly will not take the politics out of fixing an election date, nor will it shorten election campaigns. In fact, looking south, I suspect that it will make election campaigns much longer. People are already preparing for the 2008 presidential elections and for senatorial elections two or even three years down the road as well.

However, this fixed election date will mean that a prime minister would no longer have the opportunity to call an election when it is thought to be to her or his advantage. In Nova Scotia, we had a case in the 1980s. Premier and then Senator Buchanan was elected in 1978. He called an election in 1981 and another one in 1984. It was similar to what we had at the federal level through the 1990s.

Fixed elections might also level the playing field for all participants by providing certainty for candidates who are seeking to become members of Parliament. I think that is important.

I recall that when I was seeking election, there were a lot of decisions to be made. There is a lot of planning with one's family and with one's business if one happens to be a business person. There is an awful lot of work that has to be done around identifying when one is going to make the announcement.

In the case of people who may be in business, or partners in business, a position similar to my own, can one in fact be a nominated candidate for a year or perhaps even two years not knowing when the election might be? I think that is worthwhile considering.

We all know the risk involved in running for office. We set aside our lives to run in the hopes of winning. Many who have jobs without protection must, in a relatively short period of time, make significant changes in their lives to run for office, so I think fixed elections will allow individuals the opportunity to plan effectively to run for public office.

Those are positive elements and, as I say, I look forward to supporting the legislation and bringing it to committee. It is my hope that when it comes back I can vote for it again.

There are, however, some questions that I think need to be addressed, not the least of which is the issue of what constitutes confidence and what parameters might exist that would not allow a government the opportunity to circumvent the legislation for its electoral advantage.

For example, we would want to avoid any situation whereby an election is called, or orchestrating an election, let us say hypothetically next spring or even this fall, perhaps after the introduction of a budget before it has been debated, or triggering an election before bad news arrives. For example, maybe the government has some indication of pending release of documents suggesting there might be some ill-conceived action that has taken place.

I think we need clarity as to what constitutes confidence and what parameters would exist in that regard. Could the softwood lumber vote today be an issue of confidence? Could the gun registry vote be an issue of confidence? I think these are some important constitutional issues that need to be addressed.

Our Constitution does not contain many provisions regarding elections. Section 50 tells us that the House of Commons shall continue for up to five years. Section 4 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms suggests that:

No House of Commons and no legislative assembly shall continue for longer than five years from the date fixed for the return of the writs of a general election of its members.

In any event, I will support this bill in the initial stages, and I hope in the later stages, in the hope that the committee will spend as much time as possible in ensuring the bill makes sense and answers some of the questions proposed here and yesterday in debate in this House.

I must address another issue tied into public confidence, and occasionally public cynicism, about what happens here and how we conduct ourselves in Parliament.

Perhaps the real issue is not who calls an election or when, but how parliamentarians treat each other and the institutions of Parliament, such as, for example, question period. Question period is the time when most Canadians see us in the House of Commons. Debate clips do not usually get on TV, but question period does. During this 45 minute period, accusations are made, although the accusations seem to me to be more reasonable this year than last year, and reputations are sometimes ruined. We see false outrage and packaged answers. We wonder why people might think their elected representatives do not connect sometimes.

So is the issue of cynicism in politics solved by the introduction of fixed elections or by an overhaul of how we treat each other in this chamber? Why is it that colleagues from all sides can speak well to each other outside the chamber and enjoy a drink or dinner together, but when the cameras are on we cannot resist the temptation to replace debate with feigned outrage?

It is one thing to reform our election process, and I support that, but I hope all members would also reflect on issues related to our level of discourse in this chamber. I do not suggest that there are any angels among us. We all share that responsibility. We should all do better.

Nonetheless, I will support this bill, and I hope to support it when it comes back. We need more certainty about what constitutes confidence, about what determines when an election is called. The advantage of this bill for Canadians is that it would provide some certainty. It is important that we define certainty before we pass this bill. I will support it going to committee. I hope some changes are made. I hope very much to support it when it comes back.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member mentions that he spent 12 years in municipal politics. He knows that the difference between fixed election dates in the municipal world and under this legislation is that the mayor, for example, cannot at his discretion decide to dissolve the council and call an election. If it is a fixed election date, it is a fixed election date both in terms of principle and in reality. Under this legislation, we would have a fixed election date, but still have the ability of government to have discretionary power to call an election any time it sees fit.

Would the member or his party be prepared to look at specific amendments to reduce that discretionary power, for example, only on money matters, money bills or the Speech from the Throne? A government could come along and say it promised 15 things in the last election and has deemed each and every one of those 15 as confidence matters. Therefore, notwithstanding that we have a fixed election date four years or three years from now, it is going to deem this a confidence matter and if it loses of course it would go to an election.

What type of amendments would the member's party be prepared to look at to deal with this issue which at the moment seems to be the great flaw in Bill C-16?

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in theory, fixed election dates are very good. However, Bill C-16 has not taken into consideration what constitutes confidence. If we look at the general history we know that confidence motions are on the Speech from the Throne or a finance bill. Within the current environment, the Prime Minister, whenever it does not suit him, calls everything confidence. How does the bill help in ensuring the Prime Minister will not use that power and not create more cynicism among voters to call a snap election?

The bill is also a mishmash with the U.S. congressional model. Could you give me your thoughts on how we could improve on accountability?

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and speak to Bill C-16.

I chose to run for political office, as many here did, to make a difference. I believe we were sent here by our constituents to improve the state of the nation.

One of the areas where our nation definitely needs improvement is the structure and the function of our democracy. Before the last election, our party put forward a seven point plan to clean up and improve the state of our democracy. A friend of mine and a colleague of many who are here, Mr. Broadbent, proposed the seven point plan to clean up and put in the hands of Canadians some ideas that we could then bring to this place to improve the state of our nation and, indeed, the state and health of our democracy.

I want to go over those points. We know that with the accountability act the government quite smartly and rightly took some of our ideas and brought them forward. We certainly contributed to the committee on Bill C-2 in which the member for Winnipeg Centre and I proposed, as opposed to just opposing, ideas. We proposed some of the ideas that we had put forward in our plan, which was available to Canadians not only during the election but before the election.

To summarize the seven point plan, the first was to have democratic accountability in the House. We proposed that no member of Parliament could ignore his or her voters and wheel and deal for personal gain. No member of Parliament should be permitted to ignore the wishes of their voters and change parties. This was before the interesting musical chairs by the member for Vancouver Kingsway. We wanted to ensure that the wishes of voters were honoured. To cross the floor and become a member of another party, without first resigning his or her seat and running in a byelection, was not on.

Democracy is something that is evolving. It is an experiment of sorts and it is something where we know that when voters are not honoured, they do one of two things. Fist, they just walk away from the process, and no one wants to see that happen. Sadly, we have seen that happen over time. Second, they propose to change things.

The first thing we wanted to do in our seven point ethics packages was to ban floor-crossing. We saw that it dishonoured the wishes of voters.

The second point of our seven point plan was that election dates should be fixed, which is the spirit in the proposition the government has put before the House in Bill C-16. There are many reasons for that, which I will explain in a minute.

Point three, which we proposed before the last election, was to set spending limits in leadership contests. We saw in the previous Liberal Party leadership contest the contestant, who then became the prime minister, had over $12 million in the bank. Obviously, there was not much competition in the end, but he had lots of money. We had concerns at the time about the amount of money in leadership contests, and it was not just with the Liberal Party. Parties are largely financed by the public and the same principles pertinent to the public good should play to the internal affairs of parties as they do to electoral competition between parties.

Point four was electoral reform. This has been a demand, a suggestion, a proposition that was made probably before I was born. An organization of Canadians from coast to coast has been brought together from all parties. It has decided to focus on electoral reform, which obviously needs fixing.

Many people have suggested we look to the other healthy democracies that have proportional representation, that the will and the spirit of the voters is represented in legislative bodies. This clearly has not happened in the last number of elections. We need a process and we need to ensure that we get on with that process.

Fair Vote Canada, the organization to which I referred, has been tireless in advocating for fair elections so voters are not cheated, which has happened. It is not about parties. We know we have had majority governments that are false majorities, governments that are based on 38% and 39% of the vote. That is clearly wrong, it is undemocratic and it should be changed.

Point five was that unregulated lobbying and political cronyism must end. We have started on that path with some amendments we made on Bill C-2. We have to change government appointments so they are not patronage appointments. We have made some changes, but there is work to be done.

Point seven was access to information. Clearly, that is the window on democracy. It is a bit clouded now. We are working on that and there is more to come.

Now let me turn to the bill before us. The reason why we put forward fixed election dates long before others were talking about it in this place was because we saw the concerns that people had with the executive power, which has been concentrated over time, in the hands of the Prime Minister's Office. Some put it back to just after Pearson. We saw this lead to the deepening of cynicism among the voters of Canada. We had a previous government call a snap election when it was clear that the opposition at the time was not coalesced or organized. Why? Because it could win the election.

As was mentioned, governments sometimes go on too long. We remember the previous Conservative government, which waited until 1993 to finally let Canadians have their say. We could see a government call a snap election to get power or a government that hangs on to long. We see the benefit of having fixed election dates, but there are many other reasons, if we look to the people who have studied it.

I refer to Henry Milner, who is an author, visiting scholar and professor of political science at Laval University. He has studied this, and I consider this an objective opinion. He is one of the people we tapped into taking a look at fixed election dates. He showed that Canada is only 1 out of 12 of 40 comparable democracies that does not use some form of fixed election dates. Clearly, when we look at the juxtaposition between our democracy and others, it is worth examining, and he did that. He also said that these numbers contradicted the widely held misperception that flexible election dates were incompatible with parliamentary systems, as some have suggested.

I will turn to concerns with the fact that there have not been constitutional changes proposed in the bill. In effect, a prime minister can walk down the street and still call for an election. My colleague has made a proposal. In committee we will look at proposing ways to ensure that there are criteria on what is a confidence vote.

Most parliamentary democracies in Scandinavia and continental Europe, including several Westminster style systems, have what is called a flexible fix. In other words people would have concerns if there were a loss of confidence and the government should fall and set criteria accordingly. That is really what we are talking about: not fixed election dates, but nuance. It is a flexible fix so if there is a minority Parliament and the government loses the confidence of the House, there is an opportunity to go to the people, and that will not change. Therefore, we have fixed election dates when it is opportune.

Like many others, I am concerned that the present government is simply trying to engineer, between policy and brokerage politics, the fall of the House so it can then gain a majority. I actually think that with this debate and this bill in front of us people will become wise to that kind of backroom politicking. Not only with fixed election dates would we avoid the cynical use of power within the Prime Minister's Office, as we saw with previous governments, but the public would be aware of a fixed election date in October and would then question the government if it were orchestrating the fall of the House. The government would need to make that political argument. Is it playing brokerage politics simply to have the House fall so that it could gain a majority government? I see that as an important debate to have.

By adopting a precise date, preferably early in the fall as has been suggested, it would allow a campaign to take place at the end of the traditional vacation period in Canada. We also must take rural Canada into account. If we were to have an election too early in the fall it would affect farmers. Farmers, goodness knows, have had enough challenges and they do not need another one in front of them.

Although many of us had a terrific time going door to door in the last election and found it very invigorating ploughing through the snow, many of us, and probably most Canadians, would rather that be a footnote in history and not a practice to embrace.

If we were to build in provisions for holding early elections when necessary and in such an event stipulate that the following election would occur on the designated date four calendar years later, I believe Canadians would embrace that and it would help fix democracy.

I want to conclude by emphasizing the fact that this is something the NDP proposed before the election and it is something we embrace. We have some concerns but they can be dealt with in committee. We fully support fixed election dates.

I would like to leave the House and Canadians with the fact that this is not the end of electoral reform and democratic reform. Canadians are demanding that we fix our democracy, that we embrace the idea of democratic reform and that we embrace the idea of proportional representation. Canadians would then have genuine confidence in democracy. This is the beginning, definitely not the end. I look forward to engaging in debate with my colleagues.

[Bryon Wilfert, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, saying it does not make it so.

I support the principle of fixed election dates, however the hon. member has said that snap election dates are out and that a government cannot manipulate the process. There is absolutely nothing in the legislation that prevents the government or any future government from manipulating the process. It does not define what votes of confidence are.

Later today we are going to have a vote on the softwood lumber deal. The government, which just the other day and over the summer, said that if in the vote did not go its way, it would be a vote of confidence, the government would fall and we would have an election. At the same time it has Bill C-16 before the House. To me, that is inconsistent and indeed almost hypocritical to suggest on the one hand that we are bringing in fixed election dates, but still not dealing with the process.

How does the legislation prevent the government from manipulating election dates when in fact it is silent on it?

Unless there is an amendment, which clearly defines what votes of confidence would be, we will be subject to future manipulation by the government. I suggest that the real target is to tell the public to feel good, that we will have a fixed election date in four years, when the reality is get ready, we will have one either later this year or early next.