Bill C-29 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans)

This enactment amends the Canada Elections Act to enact rules concerning loans, guarantees and suretyships with respect to registered parties, registered associations, candidates, leadership contestants and nomination contestants.

Canada Elections Act

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

moved that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

Mr. Speaker, funding of political campaigns has changed dramatically over the years. It is no longer acceptable for political bagmen to go cap in hand to wealthy individuals and powerful interests seeking contributions for a political campaign. Our government understood that this era was over. After hearing tales of bags of cash exchanging hands between Liberals during the Gomery inquiry into the sponsorship scandal, the Canadian public demanded action. They demanded that big money be eliminated from the political process.

Upon taking office, we delivered with the toughest anti-corruption legislation in Canadian history, the Federal Accountability Act.

The Federal Accountability Act limited individual political contributions to $1,000—$1,100 in 2008—and prohibited cash donations of more than $20, secret trusts and corporate and union donations.

These changes applied to all types of political entities: political parties, registered associations, leadership candidates, local candidates and nomination contestants.

The Federal Accountability Act levelled the playing field. After it was passed and various amendments to campaign financing legislation took effect, the government believed that the era of political fundraisers was over and that rich and powerful interests could no longer unduly influence the political process.

Some people say that money in politics is like water on concrete: it finds every crack and every crevice through which to flow. Watching the Liberal leadership contest, Canadians found this out the hard way.

The Liberal Party, after relying for years on massive donations from huge corporations, found it difficult to operate in a system that relies on the contributions of ordinary, hard-working Canadian individuals. As a result, while the Federal Accountability Act was proceeding through the legislative process, Liberal leadership contestants discovered a loophole that allowed them to borrow unlimited amounts of money from corporations, unions and wealthy individuals. This loophole effectively allowed candidates to circumvent campaign contribution limits by accepting massive personal loans and resulted in Liberal leadership candidates mortgaging themselves to powerful, wealthy, vested interests.

The accidental Leader of the Liberal Party borrowed $705,000. The accidental Canadian, the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore, borrowed $570,000. The accidental Liberal, the member for Toronto Centre, borrowed $845,000, and of that, $720,000 came from his brother, John Rae, an executive with Power Corp. and a powerful Liberal insider.

In addition, Gerard Kennedy borrowed over $450,000. The member for Vaughan borrowed over $450,000. The member for York Centre borrowed $300,000. The member for Eglinton—Lawrence borrowed over $240,000. The member for Kings—Hants borrowed $200,000. The member for Vancouver Centre borrowed over $150,000. The member for Willowdale borrowed $130,000. The member for St. Paul's borrowed nearly $40,000.

Collectively, the Liberal leadership candidates borrowed millions of dollars to finance their campaigns. By exploiting the loophole in the Canada Elections Act, they were able to skirt campaign contribution limits that expressly sought to end this sort of undue influence by rich, powerful individuals.

In short, the Liberal leadership contestants showed Canadians that big money found a back door into the political process. More important, it also became clear there was a possibility that rich, wealthy individuals could write off a loan as uncollectable if it was consistent with their lending practices, even if they had no such established practices.

In effect, people could lend money to leadership campaigns and then after 18 months could say the debt was uncollectable and simply write it off. This could result in a massive contribution to a campaign which would far exceed someone's individual contribution limit. Under the current law, this could actually happen.

Now that the loophole and its potential consequences were clear, the government decided to act. The government was not going to sit by idly and allow the Liberal Party to undermine the Federal Accountability Act, especially after the Liberal leader was victorious in his leadership contest, financing nearly half of his campaign with massive personal loans from individuals.

In the first session of this Parliament, we introduced the accountability with respect to loans bill, which at that time was Bill C-54. After prorogation of the first session, that bill became Bill C-29 in this session of Parliament. My speech today opens debate on this bill at third reading.

While I have mentioned the various elements of the bill during previous speeches in this House, I will quickly run through the proposed changes once again.

First, in accordance with the Federal Accountability Act, it limits the amount that an individual can lend to or guarantee on behalf of a campaign to the contribution limit of an individual, or $1,100 in 2008. In addition, the combined total of loans and gifts from an individual cannot exceed the contribution limit of $1,100.

Second, it prohibits unions and corporations from lending money to political entities, which is also in keeping with the provisions of the Federal Accountability Act.

Third, it establishes a standard procedure for reporting loans, which applies to all political entities—associations, candidates and parties. This procedure will replace the provisions of the current act, which provides different rules for the various political entities.

Fourth, riding associations will automatically assume responsibility for the debt of local candidates should the latter be unable to repay their loans. Hence, candidates will no longer be able to evade their responsibilities.

Those are the four major changes originally in the bill. Further changes were made as the bill passed through the legislative process.

First, the time period for the repayment of loans was extended to three years from eighteen months. The government opposed this change at committee, but in the spirit of cooperation, we agreed to the amendment so that the bill could move forward.

Second, the bill was amended so that if an individual's loan was paid back within a given year, he or she could still donate up to the contribution limit.

Third, the bill was amended to require the Chief Electoral Officer to hear representations from affected interests before making a determination about a deemed contribution. This change, although technical in nature, would ensure certainty, uniformity and procedural fairness in dealings with Elections Canada.

Now that the bill is in its final form in the House, the first question we have to ask ourselves is this. Does this solve the identified problem and close the loophole? The answer is yes.

Under our bill, only accredited financial institutions would be able to lend money beyond the contribution limit and only at commercial rates with terms and conditions fully disclosed. No longer would leadership contestants be able to accept massive personal loans from friends, family and vested interests to finance their campaigns.

The bill would also prevent a situation from occurring where a lender could have the power of deciding whether a leadership candidate broke the law. Under the current law, one of the options for seeking an extension of a loan is to have a binding agreement to pay. As a result, the lender, by the fact that they can choose to sign the agreement or not, can decide whether a leadership contestant breaks the law. A loan is deemed to be a contribution after 18 months unless Elections Canada grants an extension.

Under our bill, this could no longer happen. Individuals could only lend or contribute a total of $1,100. Therefore, if after 18 months, a loan had not been repaid and it was deemed to be a contribution, an individual's contribution limit would not be exceeded.

While our bill would improve accountability and increase transparency, recently there has been some criticism that it does not really change anything. That is simply not the case. The criticism is in fact misplaced.

I will point to the following. Under the current law, wealthy elites can exploit a loophole and land unlimited amounts of money to leadership contestants. Under our bill, that would no longer be possible. Individual loans would be limited to $1,100.

Under the current law, unions and corporations, although prohibited from making contributions or donations to political parties, can, however, still participate by lending unlimited amounts of money to leadership contestants, candidates, parties and associations. Under our bill, that would no longer be possible. Unions and corporations would be banned from lending money to political entities in the same fashion as they would be already prohibited from making contributions.

Those are two significant changes to the way political campaigns are financed in our country.

The government understands that loans have a role to play in the financing of political parties, candidates and associations.

The government is opposed to a situation where individuals, unions or corporations are able to provide loans in order to exercise undue influence on the political process.

If a leadership candidate, local candidate or major national party wants to collect more money than the amount set out in the act, it should go to an approved financial institution, borrow money at the commercial interest rate, then disclose in full the terms of the loan in an open and transparent way. This practice works well in a number of provinces. Why do this? Because it is the job of an approved financial institution to assess risk and lend money. It has established lending practices and is accountable to its shareholders for the loans it approves.

Furthermore, the government does not believe that political entities should be authorized to borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars from rich individuals, who do not usually lend money, who have no established lending practices and who are not accountable to anyone for the loans they make.

The government does not believe political entities should be allowed to borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars from multi-individuals who do not normally lend money, who have no established lending practices and who are accountable to no one but their own interests for the loans that they make.

In the last election Canadians sent us a message.They want to end the influence of big money in the political process in Canada. They want greater accountability, increased transparency and, most important, a level playing field.

Our accountability with respect to loans bill will achieve this by closing the loophole that gives rich, powerful interests an opportunity to exert undue influence in the political process.

Before I close, I want to thank the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre for his considerable support and assistance in ensuring that the bill was able to make it through the process to this stage. I am hopeful and optimistic that when it reaches the Liberal dominated Senate, that it will respect the importance of a decision taken by the House of Commons with regard to elections for members to the House of Commons and the rules that govern them. I hope senators will not take the opportunity to obstruct and delay the bill in their party's partisan interests, but will in fact respect a decision of the House of Commons about how the House of Commons should be elected.

I urge all members of the House to work with the government to pass the bill and take another step toward eliminating the undue influence of big money from Canadian politics, and I hope that we will do that very soon.

[Catherine Bell, NDP, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's speech about honouring the will of the House. He talked about when the bill was sent to the Senate, whether the members of the Senate would honour and help push it through.

Several bills have been passed by the House and have gone nowhere. The member and the Conservative Party said, during the election campaign, that they would honour the will of the House. That was very clear, yet we have several bills, for example, the veterans first motion, the seniors charter and other bills, that have been delayed. They have gone nowhere.

Would the member guarantee that the government will ensure that these motions and bills, because they were passed unanimously or by the majority of members of the House, are respected and passed also?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I share the hon. member's concerns about what happens to the business we send to the Senate. As the House knows, our government has a very complete program of modest, but important changes, to how the Senate operates, which we believe would help to democratize it, reform it, make it more accountable and make it more consistent with 21st century values that Canadians expect. Those include our provision that terms be limited to eight years in the Senate and our proposal that Canadians be consulted on who should represent them in the Senate.

The hon. member raises a very good point. One of those bills, the one relating to term limits, actually originated in the Senate, but it successfully delayed it for over a year before we finally introduced it on this side in the House because the Senate was not willing to deal with it.

We have seen the Senate on a number of other bills indicate an unwillingness to deal with matters for what are strictly partisan reasons or otherwise. There is a great concern about that in our system, where we are dealing with a body that, to say the least, lacks the full legitimacy of a democratically elected body such as the House of Commons.

This is why we want to see those changes brought into place. I would welcome the support of the hon. member and her party for both of those elements, term limits that we have proposed as well as the proposal that we consult with Canadians as to who should represent them in the Senate.

I believe if both of those were in place, we would see a body that would be more responsive in dealing with legislation that Canadians have expressed, through the House of Commons, they wish to see passed and of which we know Canadians are strongly in support.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans).

I remind all those who are watching at home that the bill was originally introduced, as my colleague said, as Bill C-54 in the first session of the 39th Parliament.

The bill would create restrictions on the use of loans by political entities governed by the Canada Elections Act, rules that we all respect during elections. We continually strive to ensure that transparency and accountability is within all of our parties.

The bill would establish a uniform and transparent reporting regime for all loans to political entities, including mandatory disclosure of terms and the identity of all lenders and loan guarantors. Total loans, loan guarantees and contributions by individuals could not exceed the annual contribution limit for individuals established in the Canada Elections Act. Only financial institutions and other political entities could make loans beyond the annual contribution limit for individuals and only at commercial rates of interest. Unions and corporations would be unable to make loans and financial institutions could not lend money at rates of interest other than the market norm.

Rules for treatment of unpaid loans would be tightened to ensure that candidates could not walk away from unpaid loans. Riding associations would be held responsible for unpaid loans taken out by their candidates.

As I indicated before, my constituents and I welcome initiatives to improve accountability in the federal government, as I believe all would at all levels of government.

Bill C-29 is a continuation of the groundbreaking work done by the previous Liberal government. My government showed great integrity by reviewing the responsibilities and the accountability of ministers, senior officials, public servants and employees of crown corporations.

A wide variety of concrete measures were adopted to increase oversight in crown corporations and audit functions were strengthened across the board. It was time for us to bring in tighter legislation to ensure transparency and accountability. This was not invented two years ago. The Liberal government worked on this for a long period of time to ensure transparency and accountability. Does everybody follow it? Clearly some members did not and still do not.

From his first day in office, our former prime minister reformed government so that everyone in the public service would be held to account. It was the Liberal government that re-established the Office of the Comptroller General of Canada, very important for all of Canada and its citizens.

It was the Liberal government that strengthened the ethical guidelines for ministers and other public office-holders and established an independent Ethics Commissioner. They are extremely important guidelines. It is important to have an Ethics Commissioner who assists and guides members of Parliament to ensure that we do the best job we can and that we do not get into conflicts of interest.

Many of these things were long overdue, and I am pleased the previous Liberal government brought these issues forward.

It was also a Liberal government that introduced a publicly posted recusal process for members of cabinet, including the prime minister.

Much of the legislation that has been brought in with respect to transparency and accountability is modelled after what the Liberal government introduced.

The Liberal government also put forward legislation to encourage whistleblowers and to protect them from reprisal.

In February 2004 our Liberal government put forward an action plan on democratic reform to strengthen the role of parliamentarians. We heard a lot of debate about democratic reform and about allowing people to have more free votes and an opportunity to have more public and free debate and so on. It was clearly followed when the Liberals were the government of the day.

Referring more bills to the House committees before second reading gives all of us an opportunity to make significant changes in those bills. Otherwise, if they go to committee after second reading, which was the norm until those changes were made in February 2004, there was very little we could do. The principle of the bill was there and we could skirt around it but we could not do a whole to change it. That has made a significant difference in the work that we all do in committee. Again, that was work that we did so members of Parliament would have more opportunity to influence and shape legislation.

We also implemented a three line voting system to allow for more free votes. That was quite important because it was not here in the first five years I was a member of Parliament. We all voted as a bloc with our party. Having the three line and two line voting system gave all of us as MPs on our side of the House when we were in government much more freedom to express what we really felt about various issues.

That was important and it is unfortunate that we lost it. We still have a lot of freedom on this side compared to the government party certainly but having the three line voting system was starting to introduce more democracy to the House of Commons.

We have also pushed for the establishment of a committee of parliamentarians on national security. The Liberal government strengthened audit practices in the public sector through a comprehensive initiative that included the policy on internal audit and to strengthen and further professionalize the internal audit function throughout the government through higher professional standards, recruitment of additional skilled professionals, training and assessments.

In 2004, my government delivered on a commitment to proactive disclosure. Since April 2004, all travel and hospitality expenses of ministers, ministers of state, parliamentary secretaries, their political staff and other senior government officials have been posted online on a quarterly basis. That is accountability. That is being open and transparent so that anyone can go online to see just how much travel and hospitality expenses were, where they were incurred and who went where. That is opening the door in many ways to what goes on in government.

Government contracts worth more than $10,000 are disclosed publicly and, again, posted online. Those were all initiatives by the Liberal government.

My government embraced transparency in key appointments, which was also very important. Through our action plan for democratic reform, parliamentary committees were empowered to review the appointments of the heads of crown corporations, something that should have been done a long time ago to ensure transparency and accountability to Canadians and taxpayers.

We brought increased transparency to the selection of Supreme Court justices and committed to expanding access to information. The Access to Information Act was extended to 10 key crown corporations that were previously exempt from this. We also presented a discussion paper to Parliament that proposes, among other measures, that the Access to Information Act be expanded to several federal institutions that are currently exempt. However, sadly, the Conservatives' secretive paranoia has led to the demise of access to information in this country, and that is a complaint we continually hear from citizens and the media on just how difficult it is now that has been closed down.

My government was the first to seriously limit both individual and corporate political contributions, as well as third party election spending. As my colleague attempts to take credit for all of the changes that were made, he needs to be reminded to look back because the real serious changes to the Elections Act came from the Liberals, not from the current government.

Our Bill C-24 was enacted in June, 2003 and came into effect on January 1, 2004, representing the most significant reform to Canada's electoral and campaign finance laws since 1974. It was well overdue, it was a good act and it made everything much tighter and more difficult but it was much needed. I am quite proud of the fact that our government did that. I am doubtful that the current government would have ever done it.

The act affected contribution limits, those eligible to make contributions, public funding at political parties, spending limits for nomination contestants and disclosure of financial information by riding associations, nomination contestants and leadership candidates.

The Liberal Party supports efforts to increase transparency and accountability in the electoral process. Our history has shown that and we will continue to support that.

We are the party that initially passed legislation limiting the role of corporations and unions in electoral financing and introduced the most dramatic lowering of contribution limits in Canadian history.

All of the Conservatives' accountability facades just build on the great success of the previous Liberal governments.

Candidates for the leadership of our party went beyond the requirements set out by Elections Canada in reporting loans to their campaigns. In contrast, the current Prime Minister still refuses to disclose the names of those who donated to his leadership campaign in 2002.

For ours, people can go online to see every cent that was donated, every cent that has been paid back, where it came from and what is still outstanding. We are not hiding anything, contrary to him.

Whatever it is, the Conservatives certainly do not want to talk about it so they have decided to spread misconceptions about this bill instead.

The Conservatives are misleading Canadians about the current state of the law concerning political financing. The Conservatives are suggesting that the current law allows loans to be made in secret and that Canadians are kept in the dark. That is not true.

The truth is that under the law that is currently in place, the details of all loans, including the amount of every loan and the name of every lender and every guarantor, must already be publicly disclosed.

In addition, the Conservatives are also suggesting that the current legislation allows for loans to be written off without consequence. Again, this is absolutely false. Under the current law, loans cannot be used to avoid donation limits and they cannot be written off without consequences. The proposed new law simply restates the existing rules.

The Conservatives seem to think that Canadians can be fooled into believing that this somehow constitutes a dramatic change but Canadians can see through their charade.

The government has been playing a game of delay and deflect, perhaps to draw attention from its recent troubles. By talking about political loans, clearly, the Conservatives are trying to make us all forget about their little visit from the RCMP at their own party headquarters, or perhaps they are happy to talk about political loans to distract from their latest disgrace, the former minister of foreign affair's security breach and subsequent resignation, or maybe they are trying to distract from their constant politics of division, in which they specialize, by pitting one province against another.

However, let us get back to the bill that is before us today. The bill was significantly amended following hearings by the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. However, now that the bill has been reintroduced in the House and will be debated at report stage, the government has made three motions to effectively strip portions of these amendments from the bill.

I do not have time to get into all of the details of the amendments that we had put forward to strengthen this bill but I can comment on the Conservatives' motions to undo our work at the committee level.

Government Motion No. 1 would delete the Liberal amendment to allow for annual contributions to a leadership candidate.

Government Motion No. 2 would make it necessary for loans to be repaid annually, rather than at the point when the loan becomes due. Effectively, this would prevent candidates from taking extended loan repayments.

Government Motion No. 3 would delete the Bloc amendment that removed liability from registered political parties for loans taken by candidates.

The government, again, is not respecting the committee process, which is a process that we all talk about how important it is and yet, if we turn around and undo the work of committee, it clearly questions what was the value of the time and effort put into that.

In closing, I want to say that Canadians must have faith in the integrity of government and in the people who administer it. My government worked very hard to be accountable to the citizens of this great country and I am committed to supporting measures to enhance our prior work of building accountability, transparency and the public trust.

[Lloyd St. Amand, Liberal, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the very cogent and persuasive speech of my colleague from York West.

I just wonder if my understanding is correct, which is that each of the leadership candidates in the Liberal Party's leadership contest, which culminated in a terrific, exciting and most enjoyable convention in December 2006, has entirely and fully complied with the rules and regulations established by Elections Canada?

However, I understand that there are ongoing inquiries with respect to the Conservative candidates in the last election, dozens of Conservative candidates, as I understand it, whose habits, so to speak, during the last election campaign are being scrutinized by Elections Canada.

I would like to ask the member if my understanding is in fact correct.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one of the challenges that the House affairs committee has been dealing with is the in and out issue that were pointed out by Elections Canada following the last election.

If my memory recalls it right, I believe 62 members in the Conservative Party were pointed out by Elections Canada as overspending their limits due to a so-called in and out scheme. Unfortunately, that got tied up in the procedure and House affairs committee and I believe, through the filibustering, absolutely nothing has happened to resolve that issue. Quite possibly we will be going into another election campaign. It is unfortunate for the 62 members because they will be going into an election campaign not having cleared off from the last one and, no doubt, could have additional problems as a result of that.

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I rise today to speak about the bill before us, Bill C-29.

First of all, I would like to say that the Bloc Québécois supports this bill, which seeks to prevent individuals from bypassing campaign financing rules. We believe that it is necessary to regulate loans in order to prevent people from getting around the financing limits. Remember that these limits were established after a long fight by the Bloc Québécois to put an end to corporate funding and to limit individual contributions, as Quebec did 30 years ago.

This bill corrects another problem in the Federal Accountability Act—formerly Bill C-2. As we were studying this bill, the Conservative government was more interested in quickly passing the bill than putting an end to ethical problems. The opposition parties, the media, and Democracy Watch pointed out the problem at that time, but the government refused to take action.

The current bill solves the problem of loans that made it possible to circumvent limits to political contributions. It must be said that several ethical difficulties were not addressed by Bill C-2, for instance, poor protection for whistleblowers and the failure to reform the Access to Information Act.

Bill C-29 incorporates the only change proposed by the Bloc Québécois when Bill C-54 was studied in committee. Remember that the Bloc Québécois was strongly against political parties being held responsible for debts incurred by their candidates, even though the political party is not named on the contract between the candidate and the bank. Remember also that the government listened to reason and reintroduced the Bloc Québécois amendment in Bill C-54.

The Conservatives introduced this bill, claiming that a number of Liberal candidates in the last leadership race took out large loans in order to circumvent the contribution limits. It may be true that some Liberal candidates did this, but let us not forget that the Prime Minister himself has not yet disclosed all the contributions he received during the 2002 leadership race.

The Conservative Party is not a bastion of transparency and ethics. Consider, for example, all the back and forth between political offices and lobbying firms, the contracts awarded to political friends, the use of public funds for partisan purposes, the many partisan appointments, the ideology-based appointments of judges and immigration commissioners, and the publication of a guide for Conservative committee chairs describing how to obstruct the work of committees.

Of course, we must prevent the law from being circumvented. The Bloc Québécois is in favour of this bill that, as I said, would prevent people from bypassing campaign financing rules.

At the time, Bill C-2 introduced new restrictions on campaign contributions, limiting any individual's annual contribution to a registered party or candidate to $1,100. Furthermore, the amount a union or business could contribute annually to a registered party or candidate was reduced to $0.

Unfortunately, it was still possible to circumvent these restrictions by taking out personal loans. We saw this when several candidates in the recent Liberal Party of Canada leadership race took out sizeable loans from individuals and financial institutions. The hon. member for Toronto Centre comes to mind, for example, who took out loans totaling $705,000.

The Leader of the Opposition took out loans to the tune of $655,000. Bill C-29 corrects other shortcomings that were in Bill C-2 at the time.

The bill before us is intended to correct another problem; that of government accountability. As I was saying earlier, during the study of Bill C-2, the Conservative government was more interested in passing the bill than in correcting ethical problems. At the time, organizations like Democracy Watch, the opposition parties and the media raised the issue of circumventing contribution ceilings and the government refused to do anything about it.

And yet, other ethical problems persist. Bill C-29 corrects the problem of loans that circumvent limits on political contributions. However, a number of ethical problems, such as protecting whistleblowers, were not resolved by Bill C-2. A number of Conservative election promises to protect whistleblowers did not make it all the way to the Federal Accountability Act.

The Conservatives said they wanted to “ensure that whistleblowers ... are provided with adequate legal counsel”. The Conservatives' bill provides just $1,500 to cover legal fees, which is totally ridiculous. It is also worth mentioning that the Conservatives said that we need to “give the Public Service Integrity Commissioner the power to enforce compliance with the [whistleblower] act”. They said they also wanted to “ensure that all Canadians who report government wrongdoing are protected, not just public servants”. Finally, they planned to “remove the government’s ability to exempt crown corporations and other bodies from the [whistleblower] act”.

Allan Cutler, one of the original whistleblowers in the disclosure of the sponsorship scandal and a former candidate for the Conservative Party during the 2005 election, was somewhat critical of Bill C-2 at the time. He maintained that Bill C-2 was far from perfect and had some problems that needed fixing, especially with respect to the provisions for protecting whistleblowers. The government could have used Bill C-29 as an opportunity to fix the shortcomings of Bill C-2 with respect to whistleblowers. However, the government did not decide to make such amendments to the legislation.

Bill C-29 could have done something about reforming the Access to Information Act, an important aspect that Bill C-2 ignored.

On April 5, 2005, the Liberal government released a discussion paper on reforming access to information. This document met with general criticism. In addition to doubling the minimum administrative fees charged to the public, the Martin government's plan would have maintained all the exceptions provided for in the legislation. In fact, in 13 years, the Liberal Party never managed to introduce one valid reform of the Access to Information Act, which severely penalizes the opposition parties as well as citizens and media who use the system to get more information. Bill C-29 should have included significant amendments. Bill C-29 should have included reforms to the Access to Information Act.

We are still waiting for the Access to Information Act to be reformed. As it turns out, once in power, neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals are especially eager to reform the legislation. The Information Commissioner recently pointed out that all governments share this reluctance.

This is how he put it:

The reason that action, not more study, is required is that governments continue to distrust and resist the Access to Information Act and the oversight of the Information Commissioner.

That is what the Information Commissioner said in an earlier report.

With respect to election financing transparency, both the Liberals and the Conservatives are vying for the title. When the Conservatives introduced Bill C-29, they claimed that several Liberal candidates took out significant loans to bypass funding limits during the last leadership race. As I said just now, in December 2006, the Conservative Party and the Prime Minister admitted that they had failed to disclose receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Chief Electoral Officer. The money was collected in the form of “registration fees” paid by Conservative delegates to attend the Conservative Party of Canada's May 2005 convention.

Clearly, there is a lack of transparency. The government refuses to enforce the ethics and transparency rules. A few months into its mandate, the Conservative Party released a road map that demonstrates its lack of political will to follow the rules and to put an end to the political culture of entitlement.

This government reprimanded the Liberals for the comings and goings between political offices and lobbying firms. Yet, since taking power, the Prime Minister has appointed former lobbyist and current Minister of National Revenue as the head of National Defence, and he made lobbyist Sandra Buckler his director of communications.

This government also awards contracts to Conservative friends. The Prime Minister's government awarded a communications contract to Marie-Josée Lapointe, a former member of the Prime Minister's transition team. This contract goes against the spirit of the Federal Accountability Act, since political staff are not allowed to receive contracts from the government for 12 months after they have left. Believe it or not, the contract was cancelled halfway through.

This government also uses public funds for partisan purposes. In March 2006, the Conservative government awarded an $85,000 contract to gauge public support for the Conservative Party's five electoral priorities. In July 2006, the Conservative government awarded a contract to Strategic Counsel in order to poll public opinion on various political issues. The very partisan report identified the environment as a very important issue for the government's re-election. It should be noted that Strategic Counsel is run by Allan Gregg, who was the Conservative Party's official pollster under Brian Mulroney and Kim Campbell.

To sum up, the bill would establish a uniform and transparent reporting regime for all loans to political entities, including mandatory disclosure of loan terms and the identity of all lenders and guarantors. The bill would prohibit all unions and corporations not only from making contributions, in accordance with the Federal Accountability Act, but also from lending money.

Moreover, loans, loan guarantees and contributions from individuals could not exceed the limit set out in the Federal Accountability Act, which was $1,100 for 2007.

Additionally, only financial institutions or other political entities would be able to lend money—at market interest rates— exceeding that amount. The rules for unpaid loans would be tightened so that candidates could not default on their obligations.

Loans not repaid within 18 months would be considered a political contribution. Riding associations, or where there are none, the parties themselves, would be held responsible for their candidates unpaid loans.

I would like to take this opportunity to make a small correction. Unfortunately, the government did not listen to reason and did not reintroduce the amendments proposed by the Bloc Québécois. Sadly, that Bloc Québécois amendment was defeated at the report stage, by the NDP and the Conservatives, among others.

I just had to make that correction. Overall, however, I must say we are in favour of a bill that prevents individuals from circumventing the campaign financing rules.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I returned a little late from committee so I did not hear the entire speech put forward from the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie.

However, I am following this debate, and I know that many Canadians are following this debate as well, especially in light of the energy and all the hype around the upcoming presidential race, the selection of the Democratic leader, that leadership process, and the vast amounts of dollars that are laid out within that process.

It just astounds me. I know that many Canadians watch Wolf Blitzer on The Situation Room every day and are awed by the amount of money that it takes to pursue that opportunity within the American system. It is considerably different in Canada.

I had the great privilege to work with former prime minister Chrétien when he brought forward the initial tranche of changes, with a different focus and approach as to how we go about funding political parties here in this country. It has evolved since the last election, bringing us to where we are today.

The member may have addressed this through his remarks, but I want to go back to the work of the committee. We know that committee recommendations are not binding on the House, in that they are brought forward as recommendations, but I wonder if he could comment on two in particular.

The first one, brought forward by the Conservative Party, allowed for loans and suretyships that are repaid in a calendar year not to count against donation limits for that year. That recommendation was supported by all parties.

The one that was put forward by the member's own party, supported by both the Liberals and the NDP, was an amendment that removed a section of the bill that forced registered political parties to assume the liability of an unpaid loan. It was thought that since candidates could conceivably secure loans without informing the central party of the status, then they could declare bankruptcy. But this would be without the approval of the national party.

The Conservatives opposed that, but as I said, it was a Bloc motion supported by the Liberals and the NDP. With the motions that are brought forward now by the government and the changes in this, it would gut both of these recommendations. Could the member could share with me why the thought is different now than it was when this piece of legislation came to committee? What has changed since then?

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what was vital and remains vital is that we prevent them from doing indirectly what they cannot do directly. That was vital.

Bill C-29 contained amendments proposed by the Bloc Québécois under former Bill C-54. One of the amendments was that the Bloc Québécois was strongly opposed to the political party being held responsible for the liabilities of its candidates, even though the political party was not a party to the contract between a candidate and the bank. Thus, at report stage, the Bloc Québécois—if I am not mistaken—introduced an amendment which, as the member said, was rejected by the Conservatives and the NDP. The attitude of those political parties with respect to this amendment is rather suspect because there had been a debate and it was a question of transparency. We must ensure—and I am going to the trouble of repeating it—that we cannot alter or get around the limits established by obtaining loans from individuals.

Thus, from this point forward, the law could guarantee that only financial institutions can enter into contracts with candidates. The intended purpose is to have a very transparent process. In Quebec, we are proud of the political party financing act, which resulted in greater transparency in our democracy.

[John Maloney, Liberal, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciated the comments of the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie and his input to the debate.

I would ask for his insight on a situation whereby the Liberal Party proposed an amendment and the Bloc Québécois supported that amendment, one that would have allowed annual contributions to a leadership campaign debt until that debt had been repaid in full, and the government submitted a motion to revoke that amendment.

Could he provide the House with any compelling reason why the Liberal amendment should not proceed as worded?

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this government is characterized by its culture of secrecy and entitlement.

Just as with Bills C-2 and C-54, it is clear that the government hopes to be able to get around the established rules and give itself an out with Bill C-29. We have a legislative process in place, and we must study Bill C-29. It was a golden opportunity to make these amendments. However, it is clear from the government's stubbornness that there is a lack of transparency on the other side of the House, and we think that is too bad. These amendments and changes should have been made in Bills C-2 and C-54. Bill C-29 gives us that opportunity, but unfortunately this government has missed the boat.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for indicating the Bloc's support for this very important piece of legislation.

One of my concerns is that many times before we have seen important government initiatives, particularly on the democratic reform side, make it through this place but then get stalled in the Senate.

I believe my hon. colleague understands the importance of getting royal assent for this legislation before the next federal election, whenever that may take place.

Does my colleague share my concern? If the legislation passes this place, does he fear, as I do, that the Liberal-dominated Senate may stall the bill to try to prevent the bill getting royal assent prior to the next federal election?

[Bernard Bigras, Bloc, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, if the governing party had carefully studied our proposed amendments to Bill C-29, we would not be here. I am thinking in particular of the amendment that the Conservatives and the NDP unfortunately defeated regarding political parties' responsibility for their candidates' debts. The governing party defeated the Bloc Québécois motion and the amendment to Bill C-29, unfortunately with the help of the NDP. If we had been able to get consensus on these issues, the Senate would very likely have discussed and studied the bill much more quickly.

I do not know what is going to happen in the Senate, but it is clear that when the House of Commons is missing opportunities and the NDP and Conservatives are joining together to defeat a motion supported by the Liberals and the Bloc—which I felt was a no-brainer—then it is inevitable that the Senate will have major debates on Bill C-29.

We do not know how the debate will go in the Senate, and we cannot speculate, but I hope that the Senate will consider the amendments that were introduced here by the Bloc Québécois but were unfortunately defeated by the members and the opposition party on the other side of the House.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I pleased to have the opportunity to speak to Bill C-29. I think I echo the sentiment of all members that the House desires, very emphatically, to have an election system that is more open, transparent and clear. That is why the Liberals supported the general principle of the bill, which was brought forward to improve accountability for candidates to report loans taken during election campaigns.

Unfortunately, that is not what we get with the bill as it is presently amended. We will end up with severe limitations on the number and types of people who can run due to the fact that, believe it or not, the banks will essentially have the greatest decision-making power on the amount of financial support any given candidate can receive for his or her campaign. This is on the basis that different people have different income levels, equity levels and capacities to borrow money from banks. It is a fact.

The government continues to repeat that Bill C-29 would finally stop the undue influence of wealthy contributors who were supposedly skirting Elections Act donation limits through the use of personal loans. The bill would disadvantage potential candidates not only of the Liberal Party but of all parties. It would limit access to participation in political leadership for many Canadians.

As I have said once before when I spoke on this, we all want an electoral system that is more accountable, but what is really important is that this system of electoral accountability not limit access to different candidates who want to participate but have lower income status. The kind of accountability proposed by the government's amendments to the bill simply does not bridge accountability with equitable, fair and democratic accessibility.

Let us review the amendments proposed by the government and their impact.

First, the government wants to prohibit the possibility for individuals to make annual contributions to a leadership candidate. For a government that claims it wants Canadians to have more freedom in when and how they spend their money, this prohibition seems not to be consistent.

Second, the government proposes that all loans be repaid annually rather than at the point when the loan becomes due. Again, that does not seem to make sense since what we will end up with is an artificial limit on repayment. So much for the concept of freedom of contract.

Considering the fact that elections can be called at different times during the year and that leadership campaigns can last more than a year, it does not make sense to have someone pay off a loan before the time limit established by the loan contract. I am not sure if the government is aware that the amendments are inconsistent with the stated objectives of the legislation and will be viewed by many as narrowly inclusive, rigid and elitist.

Let us consider how much energy it would take for a successful candidate to work on repaying a loan at the end of the year rather than work on more broadly based repayment timeframes. It is totally unnecessary for anyone to have to focus on repaying by the end of a fiscal year if that was not the arrangement contracted with the lender.

Incidentally, the government wants to delete, as my colleague has said, the Bloc amendment that removed liability from registered political parties for loans taken by candidates. Again, I ask the House if it really makes sense to set up a system of responsibility for registered political parties and riding associations regardless of whether they are aware that the candidate has taken out a loan at the bank. I emphasize that making one entity answerable for the personal debt of an individual does not sound reasonable.

Let us review what we on this side have done to improve the electoral laws and what the Conservative Party has done by contrast.

Our party has shown good faith in bridging those principles that I mentioned. We have demonstrated that we want to improve electoral laws. After all, the Liberal Party was the party that passed a bill aimed at limiting the role of businesses and unions in the financing of elections, Bill C-24, in 2003.

In addition, during the last leadership campaign of the Liberal Party, all candidates stated publicly all loans received by their campaigns and they went beyond the requirements set by Elections Canada in this regard.

Recent difficulties faced by the government should dictate greater sensitivity as opposed to the kind of influence that seems to be drawn into the bill. The Prime Minister, for example, has found it difficult to report his leadership campaign contributions, going back to 2002, and there must be some legitimate reason for that.

While we are talking about the Conservative Party's record and following elections laws, let us not forget to mention the efforts of the MP for Nepean—Carleton to denounce Liberal leadership candidates. He has demonstrated, in my opinion, a really inconsistent understanding of the legislation that he is purporting and that the government is bringing forward. For example, he has been declaring that Elections Canada is not impartial.

The member said that the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville and other Liberal Party members were acting illegally by actually following Elections Canada regulations with respect to loan repayment extension requests.

With all this grandstanding, one would think the government would have proposed limits on repayment that would reflect its convictions. Despite what the member for Nepean—Carleton might claim, members of his own party have been in hot water over loan repayments. That is why I am focusing on this, because there must be a problem with the loan repayment regime.

Elections Canada has records of five Conservative candidates with loans that remained unpaid 18 months after the 2006 election. I am not saying that because I am dumping on those candidates. I feel for them. There must be reasons why they cannot repay those loans within that period of time, and this legislation will not help. In three of those cases, the donations exceed the legal maximum of the $5,400.

The government solution to its electoral rule breaking problems is to try to come up with new rules that are inconsistent with reasonable practice. The only thing that is clear is the government appears to be taking a “do as I say, not as I do” approach. How can Canadians believe in the legislation if it does not match and bridge its principles with the objectives to which I alluded?

The Liberal Party supports legislation that would make all candidates more accountable. Unfortunately Bill C-29 will limit campaign funding conditions so severely that many people, considering participating in the political process and representing their communities, will be excluded from this option.

Is that what we want to accomplish? Do we want to exclude people from all walks of life the opportunity to run for public office? The legislation, whether it means to or not, in fact will do that. Furthermore, do we want to put the power to determine one person's chance to participate in politics simply on the basis of his or equity positions, on income levels, and let the banks determine that? Do we want to give the banks that kind of power in our political process? I do not think so.

The Liberal Party supports measures to make Canadians more confident in their politicians by seeking to approve the accountability of the electoral process. The government put that forward as a first principle and we supported this going to committee because we agreed. However, we cannot support a bill that will end up limiting the opportunities of so many Canadians who may have and hopefully will have the desire to campaign and participate in our democratic process.

Therefore, I really would hope that the government would reflect on the restrictive nature of the reforms it is advocating and see that they are inconsistent with the objectives the government has put forward in terms of transparency and accountability. They do not guarantee more accessibility for a broader cross-section of Canadians to involve themselves in politics in our great country.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I thought I was listening intently. If I did, I either misheard what the hon. member said or perhaps he misspoke.

I think the hon. member was complaining about the repayment regime being too strict because repayments had to be made yearly. In fact, the legislation quite explicitly states that repayment is due three years after polling day in the case of a candidate or three years after the leadership contest has concluded, and that is up from eighteen months.

An amendment was proposed that we opposed, but we accepted in the spirit of trying to get the legislation passed. To have a three year repayment regime, by anyone's definition, is more than generous.

Would my hon. colleague to respond that?

My second question deals with a point he made at the outset of his presentation, saying that the legislation would be somewhat restrictive inasmuch as it would penalize those of a lower income bracket by not allowing them to participate in elections or leadership contests, since they would be forced to seek financing from financial institutions.

The first premise that we have to establish is regardless of income levels, if anyone who seeks public office wants to borrow money, he or she should be compelled to repay that money. To suggest that those of lower incomes would not have access because they have to go through a bank and therefore may not be able to get money through a bank loan is simply nonsensical.

Whether it be through a private individual, as is currently the case, or whether it should be to a bank, the intent, surely to goodness, would be that the individual would ultimately repay the money. If individuals from any walk of life, from any income level, are unable to demonstrate their ability to repay a loan, then suggest perhaps they should not be granted that loan.

Would my hon. colleague address those two scenarios?

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I can tell from the manner in which the question has been put forward that the member does not share the same experience as perhaps many Canadians have in terms of getting a loan from a bank.

Unless I have misunderstood him, he is suggesting that all Canadians are equal before the banks, but that is not the case. The banks do not particularly care whether in this sense the loan is related to the democratic pursuit of public office. If the member is suggesting that has any added value in the eyes of the banks, it may in the eyes of the bank manager who may have insights in his or her experience, but in terms of an institutional insight, I do not think that I would want to suggest that all Canadians will have that kind of equality.

If we take that line of reasoning, if someone has to get a loan, he or she is not going to have as much ability to do that depending on what the person's economic status is, if the person owns property, if the person has collateral. We cannot do that. We cannot even have someone put up his or her collateral in this instance.

Unless I am not understanding the bill, that is not a reasonable nor is it a fair or equitable position for us to put any Canadian in. If we are talking about bridging our principles with our desire to involve Canadians, it has been said that every private has a field marshal's baton in his knapsack. They all have the ability to stand for public office if they so desire, but at least we should guarantee the tools for them to do that.

In terms of the three years, I am saying it is not clear in the legislation that that can be contracted. If I am wrong on that, then there is one part of it that I feel an amendment has been made which accommodates that. However, that is not the understanding I have of the bill. The understanding I have of the bill is that if it is the bank and the bank wants to arbitrarily call the loan, then the loan will be called. Unless it is very clear and consistent with contract law, then there is a major inconsistency in this bill. I would suggest to the parliamentary secretary that that inconsistency has to be looked at.

[Lloyd St. Amand, Liberal, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I very much enjoyed the speech of the distinguished member for York South—Weston, and distinguished he is in this House and throughout his career in politics, including his many years in municipal politics. He is extremely well regarded in the Toronto area. Indeed he has brought those same qualities of class and dignity to the House of Commons over the last eight years. He truly knows a lot about integrity, about elections, about financing for elections and matters of that ilk.

My understanding of the legislation at this point is not as deep or as comprehensive as is his. I am not embarrassed in saying that, because he obviously knows this bill thoroughly. As I understand it, if a family member, a friend or an associate wants to lend to a candidate $2,000 on some repayment terms, the legislation will preclude or prohibit the family member, friend or associate from making a loan in excess of $1,100 per year.

I would like to ask the member for York South—Weston, is my understanding correct about that?

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for his compliments.

I had indicated to the parliamentary secretary that the breaks in the connectedness of people to even take out a loan beyond the bank is along the lines that have been suggested. In the past if one contracted for a loan, and if that is established under this legislation, it should not matter whom the loan is with as long as it is within the limits prescribed in the legislation.

The member is quite right that not only are there limits on the amounts, but there is a prohibition with respect to doing that. I have said that it is not only impractical, but it is inequitable.

The legislation tries to make it transparent that unions and businesses and so on should not be able to buy their way into the political process, but it applies the same principle to people who want to get behind people they support. As long as it is transparent and it is established in a contract and there is adjudication and transparent oversight, why should it matter whether it is someone within the limits because it has to be repaid? The bill talks about repayment. That is the issue. As long as the loan is paid back to those people as individual citizens, why should it matter? I just see it as very inconsistent, inequitable and unfair.

[John Maloney, Liberal, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think every member in the House supports the idea of openness and transparency in election financing and a restriction on wealthy individuals or corporations that try to influence the political process by giving large sums of money to candidates.

We have agreed to extend the repayment period to three years, but I am still at a loss to understand why the government would oppose annual contributions to a maximum of $1,100 for a candidate until his loan was paid.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Unfortunately the hon. member did not leave his colleague any time to respond, so we will move on.

Before resuming debate, it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Labrador, Aboriginal Affairs; the hon. member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, Government Policies.

Resuming debate. The hon. member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this bill, which deals with loans, financing and accountability.

To begin, it is important for us to go back to first principles and to look at what accountability is.

Early in its mandate, the Conservative government introduced the so-called Federal Accountability Act, but the bill had very little to do with true accountability. During our speeches I and my colleagues asked government members to define accountability in a general context. Nobody from the government could actually give a definition of what accountability is.

I will paraphrase an expert on this in Canada, Henry McCandless. Mr. McCandless was an assistant deputy minister in the Officer of the Auditor General. He is a very learned person. He wrote a seminal work on public accountability. Mr. McCandless would say that public accountability is the obligation on the part of elected officials, senior public office holders and senior public servants to explain what they are doing, why they are doing it, what it will cost, who will benefit and who will pay.

It would be sensible if the government were to put forth an accountability act that enshrined those principles for all public office holders. If we were to enshrine a true public accountability act, which could be fairly simple, the onus and the line of responsibility from those of us who are elected to those who are unelected members of the public service could be well defined. Most important, the public, the people who pay our salaries and fund this House, the taxpayers, are the individuals who would know very clearly what they could expect from all of us. It would be a liberating thing on the part of the government to introduce a bill such as that.

In defining accountability in this way, we could tell the public exactly what we were doing, why we were doing it, when we were doing it, who would pay for it and what it would cost. Members of the public, the taxpayers, could see when we did or did not do something. The line of responsibility and accountability would be there for all to see. What we were doing would be there for all to see. There would be nothing opaque about it. This is what should have happened with the Federal Accountability Act.

Rather than liberating the House, elected officials and the public service, the new Federal Accountability Act, which has nothing to do with public accountability, has added layer upon layer of responsibility and reporting. It has introduced levels of administration into the system of how the federal government works to such an extent that it is restricting the ability of the public service and the House and its members to work properly.

Why would anybody do this, some would ask. It could be a couple of things. One would be a lack of knowledge, a lack of understanding of what public accountability is. I would say that would be a less likely excuse. Rather, it is an effort to try to undermine the ability to have a strong central government in Canada.

This falls into a larger objective of the Prime Minister, who is a follower of Leo Strauss, an American political philosopher from the early 1900s. Many Canadians will not know that the Prime Minister is a follower of Professor Strauss in terms of his ideology and philosophy. It is the same ideology and philosophy followed by President Bush and Vice-President Cheney, as well as the former secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld.

It is important for people to understand that. In understanding what Professor Strauss was articulating is to understand what the Prime Minister is trying to do. It is to understand why we are not seeing the accountability that we ought to see. Instead we are seeing a truncating, restriction and weakening of the federal government.

Professor Strauss believed that the best form of governance is when a very small number of people are predestined and to lead. Professor Strauss believed that was the best form of government and that small group of people could then tell everybody beneath them what to do, what to say and when to say it. Does that sound familiar? It is happening today in the Conservative government. It is a tragedy for all members, but most important, it is a tragedy for Canadian citizens.

However, I feel very sad for the members across the way who cannot do what they need to do to represent their constituents. They are told by the Prime Minister's Office, the half a dozen or so people around the Prime Minister who direct what is happening in the Government of Canada. They tell cabinet ministers what to do and what to say. They tell backbench MPs what to do, what to say and when to say it. As a result, the ability of individual MPs in the government to articulate what their constituents want is severely restricted.

This is very interesting because it flies in the face of the roots of the Conservative Party, which is the Reform Party. The Reform Party believed in something that was very different. It believed in the power of democracy. It believed in the power of the people. It believed that we could generate the best ideas from our populace and, as elected officials, bring those ideas to the floor of the House and represent the will of the people, the ideas of the people, for the betterment of our citizens. That is what the Reform Party stood for. Yet, what we have seen is a metamorphosis, a 180-degree change.

People do not wonder why our current Prime Minister left during his first term in office. He left because his views were diametrically opposed to that of the then leader, Preston Manning, who believed, as a populist, that the power of the people should be brought to the floor of the House.

When our current Prime Minister was elected, he, true to form, did what he said he was going to do. So, in a way, I guess, democracy exercised itself. But I think that many of our citizens do not really understand that. They do not really understand that the current view of our current Prime Minister is diametrically opposed to what the roots of the Reform Party were, which was to have and build our country from the grassroots, from our people, that the power of the people, the wisdom of the people, could be exercised in this House. That is a far cry from what we are seeing today.

In fact, Professor Ned Franks and Professor Donald Savoie, the chair of governance in Canada, have made some very strong statements. They have said that MPs are nobodies on the Hill. That is a play on the term that then Prime Minister Trudeau said years ago, that MPs were nobodies 50-feet off the Hill.

Now, Professor Franks and Professor Savoie have both said that the power of the individual MP, within the context of this House, has so been undermined by the central form of government, the Straussian philosophy, that it has completely changed the complexion of what we believe is a democracy in our country. We have a nominal democracy, and that is really a shame, because what the Prime Minister should be doing is enabling his members of Parliament to bring the best ideas to the floor of this House so that they can represent their constituents.

Disagreement in this House cannot be looked on as some form of weakness on the part of a leader, or on the part of a prime minister, or on the part of anybody in this House. Rather, differences of opinion merely reflect the differences of opinion that we have in our country. Our country is not a homogenous state. Our people are not homogenous. We have a heterogeneous populace with a wide array of ideas that should and ought to be brought to this House.

All of us understand, of course, the importance of a prime minister being able to say to the public, “These are the things that I want to do; these are the things that my party stands for; and these are the things we are going to do”.

It is all well and true to have those as confidence motions. That is fine. But beyond those things that are true confidence motions, they are a very small bundle of policy ideas. Beyond that, members of Parliament should be able to express the wishes and the desires of their citizens in this House, even if it means being different from what the majority of their own party wants. There is nothing wrong with that.

In fact, many of the great ideas that we have seen in the world actually met with significant and sometimes violent resistance when they were put forward. Those have come to pass with time and history to be seen as wise ideas, but at the time that they were initially put forward, people sometimes opposed them strongly, or sometimes violently.

We have an opportunity, and certainly the Prime Minister has an opportunity, to change that. He has an opportunity to liberate our House, to liberate the members in his own caucus, to bring the best ideas to the forefront of our nation, and apply them for the betterment of our citizens.

What we are seeing now in this House bears little resemblance to the needs of the Canadian public. Most of us, and certainly all of us in my caucus, have many ideas as all party members do, but we are trying desperately in my party to bring those ideas to the forefront, to work with the government and offer those solutions that are not only important for our constituents in opposition but, I dare to say, they are important also to the constituents of members across the way.

No party has a hammerlock on good or bad ideas and there are fine ideas on all sides of this House. What the government and the Prime Minister should be doing if they were wise, would be to work with members from across party lines to put ideas forward for the public good. That is not what we are seeing. We are seeing a Prime Minister who is poisoned by partisanship and poisoned by the desire to have control. He is behaving as a control freak, if I can say that, and behaving in a way that is not in the public interest.

Take a look at what is happening in committees. Directives have come down to committee chairs and members of the government in those committees to filibuster. We get paid by taxpayers to serve the public. If the public were to take a look at what is happening in many committees today, they would be shocked and appalled. Witnesses come to those committees from across our land with good ideas and yet what they see--

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

The hon. parliamentary secretary is rising on a point of order?

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Mr. Speaker, as reticent as I was to interrupt my hon. colleague whose speeches I always enjoy listening to, I find it once again a common occurrence with the hon. member that the relevance of the topic seems to be lacking from the presentation. I know we are here to discuss Bill C-29 and I am wondering whether the hon. member could perhaps get back on topic. It would make his final comments much more enjoyable.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

I would perhaps remind the hon. member that we are at third reading stage of Bill C-29, so if he could bring his remarks as closely as possible to the bill, recognizing that it is at third reading, I think the House would appreciate that.

The hon. member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his comments. The relation between what I am talking about and the ties to accountability really does relate to this bill which is about loans, financing and accountability.

The reason why I am bringing this up is because it is quite heartbreaking, and I lamented that fact in the government's introduction of what it claimed was accountability, which is in the bill, that the accountability really does not have anything to do with true accountability.

I am trying to explain where that comes from going backward in time and backward to the origins and roots of why we are seeing the government not put bills forward with true accountability. Instead, it is putting bills forward that actually restrict and impede the ability of members in the House and the public service to work.

I want to get back to that principle and tie it in with my hon. friend, something that I know affects him and affects all of us. It is the issue of how these changes that the government has been implementing affect the public service. All of us are very privileged to work with public servants. They are some of the finest public servants found in the world. They are honourable, decent, honest, hard-working, and intelligent individuals. Members across all parties would agree that it has been a pure pleasure and a joy to work with them. We admire them for the work that they do, much of it completely unheralded.

Unfortunately, the government is actually undermining the public service, marginalizing it and not listening to it. We cannot have a strong democracy without a strong public service. Internationally, when we are dealing with developing countries, we say that one of the things that a developing country has to achieve is a strong public service. We try to help out. We could do more. But in our own House, we are actually undermining our public service and I will give a couple of examples.

A previous Liberal prime minister introduced the office of the science adviser to the Prime Minister's Office. This was a wise move because all of us here have, in some form, been involved in science, and many of my colleagues have some excellent ideas of the work in this area. We lament the fact that the government not only let go the science adviser, Dr. Arthur Carty, one of the finest scientists in our country, but also removed the entire office of the science adviser to the prime minister.

This is in a place where science and research should have a much greater play in driving public policy. If we get the science and the facts right, they enable us to connect science and facts with some of the best researchers that we have here in Canada and around the world. If we connect that to the creation and building of strong public policy, then what we have is the strongest public policy that we could possibly have in our nation for the best interests of our citizens.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I hate to interrupt my hon. colleague's presentation, but I am wondering, since we were talking about the relevance of Bill C-29 and in trying to get back to the topic of the bill we are supposed to be discussing, is the member trying to suggest that the science adviser, in some way, shape or form, has loaned the candidate some money? I just do not see the relevance. I cannot quite connect the dots, quite frankly, between what the member is speaking about and the bill we are supposed to be debating.

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if you could assure me that the member will continue with his final comments and be specific to Bill C-29, the bill we are supposed to be debating here.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Maybe it would help if I read the citation on relevance at third reading, which is from Marleau and Montpetit at page 533:

Debate on third reading is designed to review the legislative measure in its final form and is strictly confined to the contents of the bill.

The hon. member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca has about three minutes left so he could follow the good advice from the parliamentary handbook for the remaining minutes that he has.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we know that Bill C-29 is certainly aimed at dealing with how campaigns are financed and the borrowing of money. I would like to talk about that in the final moments of my speech.

All of us know very well and support the notion of ensuring that we have a situation where big money and deep pockets cannot affect public legislation and the production of legislation that we have in our country. It is something that all of us support.

In fact, we are thankful that in our country, unlike our friends south of the border and many of our citizens are aware of this, we do have limits on what we can actually spend in terms of an election, determined by the size of our ridings and the number of constituents that we have. We also have limits on what we can actually receive and what people can donate.

The problem is that the government has gone so far to one side on this particular issue that it is actually impeding the ability of ordinary citizens to donate moneys in a democratic environment and to provide financial resources that are required for people to run for public office.

That is not healthy in a democracy. Individual citizens must have the ability to fund, in a reasonable way, people who have chosen to put their lives on the line to run for public office. Unfortunately, what has happened with respect to the government and this bill, and previous bills attached to it, is that the restrictions that have been placed have nothing really to do at all with the ability of trying to remove any kind of influence with respect to money and the development of legislation.

I have been in this House almost 15 years and I have yet to see one case in this House of anybody from any political party somehow profiteering from being in this House and using moneys that they have received to change or affect legislation in the public interest. I have never seen that, and I would venture to say that nobody else in the House here has ever seen it either.

The reason for that is that we already have good checks and balances. We already have, thankfully, good restrictions on the connection between campaign finances and the ability of individuals who are running for office to receive those moneys, and I hope that continues.

In closing, I can only warn and implore the government that if it goes too far in this way, it is doing nothing that deals with public accountability. It is actually restricting a fundamental right of individuals to fund people who are running for public office and restricting the ability of individuals who want to run for public office to do so.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my hon. colleague for giving it the old college try and trying to get back on point, even though he missed it by a few miles. I have a question for the hon. member.

One of the reasons the bill has been brought forward for debate in the House is the fact that, as my hon. colleague rightly pointed out, we want to get away from the situation where big money and wealthy individuals can influence government or candidates.

In the most recent Liberal leadership campaign, we saw where one individual contributed, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates. We have also seen the situation most recently where some of the Liberal leadership candidates have not repaid their loans on time.

Currently, repayment terms are 18 months and that expired in early June. The legislation before the House would give candidates three years in which to repay loans, three years from either the polling day or the completion of the leadership campaign.

I would simply ask my hon. colleague two questions. First, does he agree that by restricting the ability for wealthy individuals to donate hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates, which, under the current legislation, could subsequently be written off, would be a good thing? Second, does he not agree that the three year repayment terms would make it more amenable for candidates and members to repay those loans?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is that we already have a situation where deep pockets cannot affect legislation. We have a situation where deep pockets cannot affect and control those who run and are successful in achieving public office. That is the principle of the matter that I think most fair-minded Canadians would adhere to.

Therefore, what the government is doing has nothing to do with trying to prevent deep pockets from affecting electoral success or government legislation down the line because the ultimate intent of providing those kinds of funds would be to have control over the person or persons who are elected.

The fact is that this is a picayune document that is intended to go after or imperil and penalize those in my party who have chosen, bravely, to run for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada. That is what this is all about. Anybody who can see this bill for what it is would know very clearly that it is nothing more than a callous and cynical political exercise that has nothing to do with true accountability or the removal of any kind of influence peddling on government legislation.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know I heard the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons refer to this assumed 18 month period for repayment of a loan. However, I must tell the House that I have read the statute. I have been an MP for about 20 years now and, with as much respect as I can cram into this, the parliamentary secretary is deluding himself and misleading the House and Canadians if he is saying that the current legislation requires loans in leadership contests to be repaid in 18 months.

The legislation refers to claims against the candidate that have to be made and paid within 18 months and there is a very clear provision that exempts loans from that class of financial translations for which there is a written agreement to pay within a period of time that extends out beyond the 18 months.

It is really unfair that a person who stands in the House as a parliamentary secretary representing the government, and I have heard other colleagues of his say this, would suggest that somehow the leadership loans that he referred to were not paid on time, when it is an illusion created by the Conservative members and misleads all of us.

Would the member care to relate those remarks to Bill C-29 that we are debating now?

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

In recognition of the fact that we are having a dialogue between two members of the same party, I would appreciate if the hon. member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca kept his comments short to allow other questions.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I could not improve upon the comments of my colleague. He is truly an expert in this and I bow to his--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Questions and comments. The hon. for Cape Breton—Canso will also take into account the admonition that I just gave so it should be short.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Absolutely, Mr. Speaker.

I very much enjoyed my colleague's comments, especially the ones specifically directed to this bill. They were well articulated.

As a caucus, our leader is committed and focused on increasing the number of women who come into this place, especially the ones who come in under our banner. Our leader has made that commitment to the Canadian people.

What I have heard from some women in my caucus, colleagues who have much more experience than I federally, is that they believe the bill would further handcuff them by not allowing them to borrow from family. The only place one can borrow money is from a bank, which they believe would further handcuff them and restrict their ability to get into politics at the federal level.

Does my colleague believe that this could in fact go against where we are trying to go as a party to increase the number of women in the House?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is an intriguing question. As a basic principle of what my colleague gave, we do not want to be in a situation where we impede high quality candidates from being able to run for public office.

I am a big fan for merit and I think people who come here are chosen by the public on the basis of merit, not on any particular personal characteristic they have outside of that. The best person in terms of the qualities of intelligence, compassion and skills that they possess should be able to come to this House.

However, what should not be a restriction is the amount of money that one has in one's pocket. One of the things all of us are very proud of is the fact that in our country someone from any socio-economic background can run for public office. That is not the case south of the border where, generally speaking, one needs to be rich to run in an election in the United States. In Canada, thankfully, which is something I am so proud of as a Canadian, someone from any walk of life can run, become elected and even become prime minister and it is not based on the amount of money one has in one's pocket.

If the government, as an outcome of this bill, restricts the ability of those with modest means to run, then we cannot allow that to happen. Every Canadian, regardless of the amount of money they have, should be able to run for public office in our great nation.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in the House today to Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act, accountability with respect to loans. I think the title, “accountability with respect to loans”, is something that is important to remind the House.

New Democrats will be supporting this legislation. I want to acknowledge the very good work that has been done by the member for Winnipeg Centre who, back in the early days of 2006 when the Conservative government introduced Bill C-2, the accountability act, attempted to have what we see in this bill as well as some other accountability measures introduced into that particular piece of legislation. At the time, however, the Conservative government did not see fit to include it.

However, some things have happened in the House over the last two years and the Conservatives now realize how important it is to talk about accountability with respect to political loans.

I want to put this a little bit into context. The former member from Ottawa Centre, Ed Broadbent, had put together a package back in 2005 called, “Cleaning Up Politics: Demanding Changes in Ethics and Accountability”. In a preamble to the document, he said:

When they find themselves in the midst of wrongdoing those with a vivid sense of right and wrong have feelings of remorse. On the other hand the defining characteristic of corruption is that feelings of remorse have been replaced by the impulse to deny, perpetuate and cover-up. The Liberal party is losing its sense of remorse.

That was in the context of 2005 when we were in the midst of the ad scandal and the Gomery inquiry. The context has changed somewhat in that the Liberals are now in opposition.

He went on in the preliminary introduction on this under the heading, “Demanding Changes in Ethics and Accountability”, to say:

Canadians are demanding changes in ethics and in accountability. They want a strong Canada resting on strong, ethically based institutions. They want honesty, fairness and transparency to be the rule, not the exception in political life.

In the context of the legislation before us, the legislation attempts, whether the attempt is real or unintended, to stop efforts to circumvent the very good rules that are currently in place in the Canada Elections Act to limit the amount of money that individuals can donate to a particular candidate.

Bill C-29 attempts to stop that circumvention of those rules by closing the loopholes that allowed businesses to loan money to political candidates and sometimes after a period of time those loans were forgiven.

I have heard members in the House talk about the fact that this legislation would damage women's opportunities to run for electoral office. I would argue that most women and men in this country want to ensure we are all playing by the same rules and part of those rules state that we do not get to circumvent the Canada Elections Act just because we happen to have a bunch of wealthy business people in our backyard, not that there is anything wrong with wealthy business people but we do not all have access to that kind of capital.

I would argue that Bill C-29 would level the playing field so that all candidates who run for either a nomination, leadership or political office, are all guided by the exact same rules. By closing this loophole to prevent candidates from either loaning themselves money or having businesses loan them money is a very good loophole to close.

We have had many instances in the House. I want to reference one example, in particular, by the member for Mississauga—Streetsville when he was a Liberal and his business donated nearly $240,000 to his riding association.

By any measure, any of us who could actually loan ourselves $240,000 or have a business friend loan our campaign $240,000 and not have to account for it in the normal process just does not seem fair, reasonable, transparent or ethical.

I applaud the Conservative government for bringing forward this legislation, again, based on the very good work that the member for Winnipeg Centre did in the past.

There are a couple of problems with the bill. The member for Winnipeg Centre has already talked about them, but it is important to highlight them.

One is that the bill is not retroactive and does not deal with the problems from previous loans that were made, like the Mississauga—Streetsville case that I talked about. Also, the bill would not be implemented until six months after it receives royal assent. In our current minority situation we could have an election at any time, so we would like to see that gap closed far more quickly.

One of the other problems we have talked about is with respect to accountability and ethics. I want to quote from a press release from July 5, 2006, issued by the member for Winnipeg Centre. He was talking about the fact that there was no age limitation. He was “urging senators to ignore Liberal appeals to amend the Federal Accountability Act by raising the age requirement for political donations to 18 years”.

In his release, he said:

This is not only a bad idea. It is a transparent attempt to divert attention away from the more serious problem with our election financing rules. We have seen Liberal leadership loans that look more like donations and the continued corporate sponsorship of leadership candidates.

The problem is not the age of donors so much as the source of the dough. It's already against the law to circumvent the donation limits by laundering money through someone else's bank account, whether that person is your grandson or your grandmother. The age issue is a red herring.

He went on to talk about the fact that he attempted to severely restrict political loans under the Federal Accountability Act. He said that “the current legislation is so vague it is evolving with every interpretation”. As only the member for Winnipeg Centre can say it, he said:

Those leadership loans are the equivalent of big money hijacking democracy. There's no collateral required, no repayment schedule registered, and the whole thing can be forgiven. How is that any different from a massive donation or corporate sponsorship?

The member for Winnipeg Centre clearly laid out some of the problems with the existing legislation and the attempts made in Bill C-29 to close those loopholes.

I also want to talk a bit more about changes in ethics and accountability. Again, because the bill is premised on the language around accountability with respect to loans, I think there are broader issues around accountability and ethics. We would welcome further changes to make sure that political candidates and political parties are all operating on the same level playing field that Canadians say is so important.

Ed Broadbent, the previous member for Ottawa Centre, made a number of suggestions in 2005. At that time, we thought we had agreement from the Liberal Party to move forward with some of those suggestions. However, as we were going into a process that would have had some broad public input across the country, the Liberal government of the day backed out of that agreement. I still think some of those proposals are relevant today.

Ethics and accountability cover every action of an elected representative. We are elected to this place as either an independent member or a member of a particular political party. We have a responsibility to our voters to fulfill our obligations. We run under a particular political banner. Should members choose to cross the floor, we feel strongly that any such members should resign and run for their new political party.

Under “Democratic Accountability for MPs”, Ed Broadbent said:

Democratic accountability should mean no MP can ignore his/her voters and wheel and deal for personal gain: MPs should not be permitted to ignore their voters' wishes, change parties, cross the floor, and become a member of another party without first resigning their seats and running in a by-election.

Wherever we can, we must put an end to backroom opportunism in politics.

In the context of political loans, I would say that many people would view them as backroom opportunism in politics. Bill C-29 would provide us with an opportunity to close that backroom door so that all Canadians who choose to run for office play by the same rules.

Comments have been made back and forth on the floor about transparent leadership contests. Under “Transparent Leadership Contests”, Mr. Broadbent said that we should:

Set spending limits and transparency conditions on leadership contests within political parties: Parties are largely financed by the taxpayer and the same principles pertinent to the public good should apply to the internal affairs of parties as they do to electoral competition between parties.

Canada has laws and regulations regulating the financing of general elections. There are limits and there is transparency.

Canadians want to see limits and transparency. They want to know where candidates get their money. They want to know that the same rules apply to all candidates. That should include leadership contests.

With regard to electoral reform, we are one of the few western democracies left with a first past the post system. Many members have spoken about this in the House.

I heard a member on the opposite side talk about increasing the ability of women to participate in the electoral process. There have been many studies done on systems of proportional representation. They consistently have found that in a system of proportional representation the participation of women in the electoral process increases.

Again, we have a minority Parliament. There is a government in place that talks about accountability. If we want to be accountable to Canadian citizens, we need to ensure that the representation in the House reflects the population. Therefore, we need to increase the participation of women in the House.

I am very proud to be a New Democrat. When we were elected in 2006, 41% of our party was women. New Democrats are very proud to run on that record. If each and every party in the House brought that same philosophy forward, we would make far better policy decisions.

Under “Electoral Reform”, Mr. Broadbent said:

--A major source of needed democratic reform is our outmoded first-past-the-post electoral system. There is a serious imbalance in the House of Commons in gender, ethnic, ideological, and regional voting preferences. Our present system does not reflect Canadian voters' intentions. Fairness means we need a mixed electoral system that combines individual constituency-based MPs with proportional representation. Most other commonwealth countries have already moved in that direction.

A major source of needed democratic reform is our outmoded first-past-the-post electoral system. In Canada every vote should matter. Ninety percent of the world's democracies, including Australia, New Zealand, Scotland, Ireland and Wales have abandoned or significantly modified the pre-democratic British system that still prevails in Ottawa.

As we amend the Canada Elections Act and closely examine some of the other factors that influence how candidates become members of Parliament, I would urge the House to consider reviewing a system of proportional representation as well, to make the system more open, transparent and accountable.

As for “Ending Unregulated Lobbying”, as Mr. Broadbent said, in talking about accountability and transparency, unregulated lobbying is one factor that many Canadians feel very uncomfortable with. Unregulated lobbying is an elitist kind of approach to getting in the back door of government. Mr. Broadbent, the former member for Ottawa Centre, said:

Unregulated lobbying and political cronyism must end: We need tougher laws requiring disclosure of fees and expenditures of lobbyists. We also need to make illegal the acceptance of contingency or profit-based fees. The government must initiate reforms with tough sanctions applicable to wrongdoing in the public sector.

Of course, he wrote this paper in 2005 when there was a different government.

With regard to ethical appointments, again we want openness and transparency. There has been a lot of controversy in the House over some of the appointments, but Mr. Broadbent called for ethical government appointments. He said:

--Unfair and unethical patronage practice must stop in the appointment of thousands of officials to federal agencies, boards, commissions and Crown Corporations. The New Democratic Party proposes that the government develop skills and competence-related criteria for all government appointments, that these criteria be publicly released and that committees scrutinize appointments.

Again, in the name of openness, transparency and accountability, I am sure Canadians would welcome a less patronage-driven appointment process so that Canadians would truly feel that they were getting the best possible person in each and every one of those jobs.

In reference to access to information, in the last two years we have seen even less access to information than we saw under the previous Liberal government. If Canadians do not have the right to know how decisions are being made and what kinds of factors influence them, it puts into question the government's claim of wanting a transparent, open and accountable government.

With regard to access to information, again, I know that the member for Winnipeg Centre has pushed for more open access to information. I know that many members of Parliament have had difficulties in getting information. We have had to complain to the Information Commissioner because information has been unreasonably delayed and denied. We have had to take that further step.

If members of Parliament have so much trouble getting information out of the government, can we imagine what it is like for the general public?

Mr. Broadbent spoke about access to information. Again, in his case he was referring to the previous Liberal government, but we have only seen it getting worse. He said:

The government is backtracking on reforms leading to greater public access to information.

He then listed a number of ways to open up access to information, which included: extending the act to crown corporations and agencies previously excluded; making ministers of the Crown, their exempt staffers and officers of Parliament subject to the act; bringing cabinet confidences under the act; improving public access to government records pertaining to third party contracts and public opinion polling; requiring government records that are more than 30 years old to be automatically opened; and so on. There are a number of other elements that he outlined in his paper.

Although we welcome Bill C-29 and it moves forward toward making sure that we do have a level playing field, the New Democratic Party and I look forward to legislation that continues on that path of accountability around the Canada Elections Act.

I would like to close by saying that in recent years we have seen a drop in voter turnout. One of the things that turns voters off, that turns Canadian citizens off from participating in the democratic process, is that they do not feel their government or their elected representatives are truly representing them here. Every effort we can make to say to Canadians that we are engaged in an open, transparent and accountable process must be applauded.

In conclusion, New Democrats will be supporting Bill C-29. We welcome this as a step forward in that accountable process so we can assure Canadian citizens that all people who are engaged in the electoral process are on a level playing field. We look forward to further legislation that supports this end.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I recognize the parliamentary secretary to the government House leader for a very short question.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I would just first point out that retroactivity was not an option in this bill because it would be a violation of the charter.

My quick question would be this. How important does the member feel it is that this legislation be given royal assent prior to the next federal election?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I absolutely agree that this piece of legislation needs royal assent before the next election.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

When we return to the study of Bill C-29, there will be nine minutes left for questions and comments with the hon. member for Nanaimo--Cowichan.

The House resumed from June 12 consideration of the motion that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are continuing debate on Bill C-29, which is a bill that the government has put forward to regulate loans made in political campaigns: elections, leadership contests and nominations.

It is an area that is probably not well understood by most people who do not participate in the political process. It is perhaps sometimes a little more complicated now than I think it needs to be, but nonetheless it is an area that does need some regulation. Federal laws have attempted to do that over the last few years.

I want to start by saying that a loan is actually integral to many campaigns. It is facilitatory to a campaign. It enables many campaigns to get up and running when there may not be sufficient funds at the beginning of the campaign.

The dynamic of a campaign varies in regard to candidate, place and circumstance, but in most campaigns there are a lot of expenses. I am talking first about campaigns for elections to the House of Commons. There are a lot of expenses at the front end of a campaign. I guess that is so in the business world too.

At the front end of a campaign, there are expenses. Perhaps one has to secure premises for a campaign office or pay cash for election signs and brochures. Deposits are required on telephones or other equipment such as computers and also on leases. At the front end of the campaign, there actually is a fair bit of uploading of the expenses.

Of course, the fundraising for a campaign can happen before the campaign, during the campaign and after the campaign, but the cash need is right at the beginning. Thus, there is the need for such a loan for most campaigns.

A lot of campaigns will have already fundraised and will have enough money to get going. Some members around here are fortunate enough to have raised enough money before the campaign even starts, keeping in mind that when we seek election to the House of Commons, there are election spending limits.

We all know pretty much what the spending limit is. For most of us, it is in the range of $70,000 or $80,000 per campaign. If a candidate has raised that at the beginning, he or she is ready to go, but what about those who have not?

For example, a member of Parliament is supposed to know roughly when an election is coming, and he or she can raise money. On the other hand, a candidate who is not an incumbent will often come in as a nominated candidate for a party that is not holding the riding. Often that person has not had a run-up of one, two, three or four years in raising money.

There is a conspicuous need in that case. A person who wants to run for Parliament for a party that has not held a riding may have a significant cash need at the beginning of a campaign. The only way to bridge that cash need is to borrow the money.

Over the past century, that money has come from friends or the father-in-law, or banks or other financial institutions, and we have managed to make do. However, recently there have been suggestions that there have been occasions when these loans have been given or granted and then, at some point after the event, they have been forgiven, so that the candidate who borrowed the money never actually had to pay the money back.

In our electoral system, that might be seen as unfair. I have a very extreme example, one that will probably never happen. Let us say that an individual says he or she is going to run for party A. Party A tells that individual not to worry, that the party will lend him or her the money to get going, and that Mr. X will lend the individual $50,000. They go through the campaign. When it is over, let us say that the candidate is unsuccessful and Mr. X says that is okay, it was his obligation to the party and he is forgiving the loan.

Let us contrast that situation with another individual who has raised $100 here and there and has worked hard and operated within the rules. It may be seen as quite unfair that a candidate or party has a rich friend who basically underwrites the whole thing and seems to circumvent what we now have, which is election contribution limits. For an individual, the limit is about $1,100 per person. A $50,000 loan lent and forgiven obviously circumvents the intent of the election contribution limits that we already have in law.

For some reason, though, notwithstanding that we have made some corrections in the past, the government party here still thinks that these loans are a big problem. It has come back with this legislation that knocks them down and almost squeezes them out of existence.

I have to say that most businesses need these types of loans. They are a part of how our economy operates. A campaign is no different. Many people have mortgages on their homes, car loans and lines of credit. Why would a campaign for the House of Commons or for a leadership not have the same kinds of financial needs? I think they do.

Under our Constitution, people who run for office ought not to be prejudiced or handicapped any more than an ordinary citizen out there doing other things, with reasonable constraints. I agree that any legislation which prevents forgiveness of a huge loan that would circumvent the election contribution limits should be established. That would be justifiable, in my view.

In this legislation, for some reason, the government, and I believe it is supported by one or two of the other opposition parties, sees a need to micromanage the loan situation, in my view overly, to the point where I think it may have crossed the line. I will explain this in my remarks a little later. Having started with the premise that we have to in some ways restrict the loan arrangements, I am suggesting that the provisions in this bill go way too far.

The amendments in this bill restrict the amount of a loan that an individual can make. I am not sure why that has to be. I can see why there is an election contribution limit, but if a loan has to be made and there has to be transparency and disclosure of it and it has to be repaid, I do not understand why it is necessary to restrict the amount that an individual can actually lend. It enforces a repayment regime. I question whether it is necessary to impose an actual time limited regime. In this case, the bill does that.

It does something else that in my view is quite insidious and unfair. The legislation says that if a loan is not repaid in a particular campaign, then the political party under which that person ran must assume that debt.

For the average citizen that may sound almost all right and what is the big deal, but if we go down to the riding level, where we have three, four or five parties running, not each of these parties running candidates at the local level are smooth-oiled machines. These are regular Canadians, some of them for the first time embarking on a run for office.

It is possible that a particular candidate may on his or her own volition, wittingly or unwittingly, borrow a ton of money. The main party may not know about it and the central campaign may not know about it. However, at the end of the time period, and it would be a sad comment on the individual, the individual could say, “To heck with it. I'm walking. I'm declaring bankruptcy”, and the main party would be stuck with that debt. That would create a huge liability contingency for all the political parties.

The large political parties, the Liberal Party of Canada, the Conservative Party of Canada, and I think the other parties represented in the House have fairly decent financial means. However, there are other political parties out on the street. Our Elections Act provides for that.

Those parties are being forced, under this legislation, to play by those same rules. I have a sense that it is unfair to impose that kind of a rule on a new or young political party. It could seriously damage it financially in a circumstance where the main party itself does not have control over what its candidates are spending and borrowing. There is no provision in our law that would allow that to happen. I could not conceive of one.

Therefore, this is a serious problem and I absolutely do not support that. I am going to do everything I can inside the House and outside, and later, to make sure this provision is not applied.

The next area I want to touch on has to do with the relationship between what this bill tries to do and our constitutional freedom. I am of the view that some of these provisions do not pass constitutional muster. I think they are vulnerable under our Constitution.

It is not clear to me that anyone has measured and assessed the constitutional implications of some of the measures in this bill. Certain parts of this legislation impose these loan restrictions. One in particular states that a candidate for nomination, or a candidate for office, or a candidate for leadership can only borrow from a financial institution. I think we have a problem.

As I said earlier, it is not clear to me why we have to restrict loans, coming only from financial institutions. It seems kind of reasonable, like we would just want to buy beer from a beer store or buy liquor from a liquor store. However, in terms of loans, this is a much different thing.

I have to say there is the perspective of the borrower, that is the candidate, which is pretty much the perspective that the government has imposed on this bill and which the other two opposition parties appear to be supporting. However, there is another perspective and that is the perspective of the lender. Of course, the lenders include everybody else in this country. We sometimes around this place focus a little too much on who we are as MPs and I am as guilty of that sometimes as others.

However, when we are talking about lending money to campaigns, it is everybody else in the country. It is all of the businesses, all of the financial institutions, all of the fathers-in-law that might lend money, or wherever we might borrow money. It is all of our citizens.

They have the right to all of our freedoms and the right to be unrestricted in what they do. I ask, why should an individual be restricted in lending money to a political campaign when a financial institution is not? What the heck are we doing? We curtail what a citizen can do, when we do not curtail what a financial institution can do. That is wrong. That is turning the whole thing on its head. In the government's rush to nail this area down with rules so restrictive, we will have to hire another army of accountants to police it.

The Conservatives have actually managed to abridge the rights and freedoms of Canadian citizens, and the only ones they wanted to leave out are the financial institutions. God love the financial institutions. We love them. We are indebted to them. We are in hock to them.

However, I have to say that the government and Parliament cannot abridge the freedoms of our citizens unless they do it properly under our Constitution. They can only abridge those freedoms, unless they do it, if they do it, for reasons that are demonstrably justifiable in a free and democratic society.

Who, on the government side, has articulated the demonstrably justifiable reasons for abridging the freedom of Canadians to participate in political campaigns, for example, by lending money, which has to be repaid, to a candidate?

There are many other types of lending institutions in society. They can lend money to buy cars. They can lend money to buy houses. They can lend money to take a bus trip, but they cannot lend money to one of the most vital institutions of our democracy, which is an election campaign.

I do not think I have heard this come up earlier, but it is a real issue for me and it has to be dealt with. The bill is at third reading. It is very tough to fix a bill at third reading, in fact we cannot.

I am inviting the other place, when it sees the bill, to review it with this perspective in mind. If the government cannot come up with reasons to abridge the rights and freedoms of Canadians out there in the way I just described it, that are demonstrably justifiable, then this provision that prohibits individuals from lending to political campaigns is not constitutionally enforceable, and it will go down. I will help to bring it down if I can. I am sure I will be able to help somewhere.

I ask the other place, when and if it has a chance to look at this bill, which I am sure it will if we pass it at third reading, to look at it.

There is a second side of the coin in insisting that only financial institutions can lend the money and it is this. We are forcing financial institutions to become partners on the street with political campaigns, and this our banks have never wanted to do. It is very difficult for them to do it. I do not know how we can force a bank manager in a particular riding to start picking and choosing between the Liberal Party, the Conservative Party, the New Democratic Party, the Bloc Québécois, and all of the other political parties. If they lend to one, do they have to lend to the others?

There is more than one bank, but this forces the banks, in a sense, to either politicize themselves or to be seen to be politicizing themselves, and this is not right either. This is a problem and I do not think that has been adequately articulated.

The bill should have had some fixes. The committee tried to fix the bill and I thought the bill had been fixed, but when we got it back to the House, the government party, in league with other parties, decided it would remove those amendments.

I am very concerned about the constitutionality of this and its impact on the street. I think we are making a mistake and for that reason I am not going to support the bill.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question, based on not today's presentation but on a comment that the hon. member made yesterday. I had spoken yesterday in questions and comments at great length about the fact that several of the Liberal leadership candidates, from their previous leadership campaign, had missed a deadline, the 18 month repayment deadline, and were seeking extensions or some other form of repayment options with Elections Canada.

The member, in response to my comments, stood in this place and went on at great length, I would suggest, to suggest my comments were in error, that there was really no 18 month repayment required. I would point out to the member that according to Elections Canada, it states so quite clearly. It says that contestants are required, not may or perhaps, to pay any outstanding debts within 18 months of the end of the contest. Of course, the end of that contest, the 18 month period, in the case of the Liberal leadership campaign, came in early June of this year.

There are some other recourses if they fail to repay at the end of the 18 month period, but the fact is there is an 18 month repayment requirement. I wonder if my hon. colleague would care to retract his comments from yesterday.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my view that the hon. member is still misleading the House and the public. He has used the term “debt”. The word used in the statute is a “claim”. It is claims that must be repaid within 18 months and there is an explicit exception for loans, where the loan has been turned into a written agreement.

I am sick and tired of hearing the government twist reality into its propaganda, the twisting of reality. If it were an 18 month deadline, may I ask anyone around here to tell me the implication of that. There was no implication when the 18 months came and went. The reason is that loans to campaigns are not claims until the person who makes the loan makes it a claim and the legislation explicitly states that if there is a loan, and it is in a written agreement for repayment, then it is accepted from the definition of the claim.

I cannot say that too many times, but let that please be the end of this misleading hokey foisted upon this House and the public by the government.

[An hon. member]

You should be in Hollywood.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Well, I am prepared to go anywhere and say this, and I am prepared to actually have a chat with Elections Canada and the lawyers at Elections Canada. Let us get this nailed down because everyone knows here that if there is a written agreement to repay a loan, it runs out beyond the 18 months, and that is exactly what has happened.

Of the $12 million borrowed for the Liberal leadership campaigns, approximately $10 million has been repaid and there is still $1.5 million or $2 million to go and that will run over for the next year or so. But, relax.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I remind my colleague from Scarborough—Rouge River that the whole principle behind the bill is to take big money out of politics so there is no unfair competitive advantage to any person running for politics because of who he or she knows.

I want to challenge my colleague on this idea and ask him to elaborate on it. Where does he get the idea that it would be better to have the loan loophole come from individuals rather than from financial institutions? The whole premise of that clause in the bill is to avoid the “good ol' boy” connections as well as the connections with business and unions, where they are not allowed to donate a single penny to an election campaign.

Under the current loophole, my union, the carpenters union, could loan me $100,000 and not push me to pay it back. That would be fundamentally wrong. It would give me an inside competitive advantage over other people running in the same election campaign who may not have connections with a union, or a business, or a rich uncle or an individual lending it to themselves. For example, it is fundamentally wrong for a guy who owns a car dealership to have his dealership loan him $250,000. However, it is perfectly legitimate for that same individual to get a $30,000 or $50,000 start-up loan from a bank or a credit union. In fact, it is necessary if we are to give equal access to the electoral system to all people who want to seek office.

My colleague has a convoluted, pretzel logic. He is a complicated man and an intellectual, but this reasoning is so convoluted that it does not hold water.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member says that the objective is to squeeze big money out of political campaigns, but this legislation would not squeeze big money out. It allows banks to lend the big money. If he thinks the “good ol' boy” network does not include bank managers, then he is deluding himself there as well.

In terms of logic, if it is okay for a bank to lend $20,000 to get a campaign up and running then, why is it not okay for a citizen to lend $20,000 to get a campaign up and running, on the assumption that the money has to be paid back and that it is disclosed as part of the campaign? This is how we do it now.

I do not understand why the hon. member is so happy foisting upon the banks the sole responsibility for providing the interim cash flow, the line of credit, or the loan, for a political campaign. All citizens should have that right, provided there is disclosure and the amount is repaid.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister for Democratic Reform]

Mr. Speaker, much to the chagrin, I am sure, of my hon. colleague from Scarborough—Rouge River, I will return to the fact, and I emphasize the word “fact”, that any unpaid debts at the end of 18 months of a leadership campaign must be repaid. That is quite clear in the elections act.

My hon. colleague has said that he is sick and tired of hearing this and that these words are being twisted because they are not debts but claims. I point out for the hon. member that the act currently includes loans as claims. Therefore, any unpaid loan is an unpaid claim.

I will give the member this opportunity to retract his earlier comments. Eighteen months is the deadline for the repayment of loans in a leadership campaign. Would he care to retract his statement now?

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Not a chance, Mr. Speaker. A loan is mentioned in the act if it is a loan that is reduced, in writing, with a term commitment to repay the loan. It is explicitly excepted from the claim provisions that have the 18 month deadline.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. There have been discussions among the parties and I think you would find unanimous consent for the following motion: That notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of this House, that at the end of today's debate on Bill C-474, standing in the name of the hon. member for Don Valley West, all report stage motions be deemed adopted, the bill be deemed concurred in at report stage with further amendments and be deemed read a third time and passed.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Does the hon. member have the unanimous consent of the House to move the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Toronto Centre.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I participate in this debate with some considerable interest.

I do not want to bore members, but I have been elected nine times, federally and provincially, under either federal or provincial statutes. I have run for two leadership contests in two different political parties in two different political jurisdictions, once successfully and once unsuccessfully, but both thoroughly enjoyable experiences.

I have had quite a considerable amount of experience, since first being elected to this place in 1978 and in the province of Ontario in 1982, in looking at the question of election financing. Therefore, I would like to put the debate on this set of amendments in a context.

For a long time, in most provinces, there were very few limits on contributions and very little transparency in the system with respect to who could spend what, whatever limits there might be, and what had to be declared of did not have to be declared. Companies, unions and individuals were allowed to give. Looking around the world, this is what pertains in a great many jurisdictions.

I think there is a very widespread feeling, and certainly one that I share, that this is not a very desirable circumstance in which our democracy should operate and that our democracy should operate under the rule of law, under a rule of transparency and of accountability and under the principle that one does not have to be rich to run for political office and that political office should be accessible to everyone, regardless of their circumstances.

Speaking very personally, the first time I ran for Parliament in 1978, I ran for a nomination in which I would have spent somewhere in the order of $500. The money was raised from a group of friends of mine from law school, who all contributed money so I could run for the nomination. The spending limit at the time I was elected would have been something in the order of $25,000 to $30,000. Contributions came in large and small amounts. It was, by any stretch of the imagination, in discussing with my American or British friends how that system compared with others, a very democratic and open system.

In the early 1970s in the province of Ontario, the premier of the day, Mr. Davis, asked Dalton Camp to chair an inquiry into election financing in the province because there had been a great deal of concern about the principles, which I have outlined: the principle of transparency, the principle of accountability and the principle that the system should be seen to be fair and should be seen to be operating in a fair manner.

Mr. Camp was a Progressive Conservative of some note and he wrote what I think many people would regard as a very fine report. He was assisted in that regard by Mr. Doug Fisher, who is well known to many of us as a public figure and commentator, a former member in this place, and by the former leader of the Liberal Party in Ontario, Mr. Farquhar Oliver as well.

They produced a report that set out some of these principles, but it also did something else, which is worth noting. The way Mr. Davis approached it was to go to the other political parties and say, “We have a problem”, not “I have a problem”, or not “I want to manipulate the system to my temporary advantage”, but “We have a general problem and as much as possible, we should try to regulate the question of election financing by consensus”.

As much as possible, the participants in politics, the political parties, should try to create institutions and methods of operation and establish a broad basis of consensus and stability that would allow us to proceed in a way that no one would be able to suggest that somehow, for reasons of temporary advantage of one kind or another, we would make a change, a change that would be seen to be benefiting one political party as opposed to another.

We all know that nothing could be more subversive of our democratic process than to have a party in government suddenly decide that it would change the rules, so it would completely undermine the position, the credibility and the ability of other parties to operate in that system.

I make no secret of my friendship with Mr. Davis and of my great admiration for him. He and I have since had occasion to work together on many different tasks and projects, including most recently the report that we wrote on improving higher education in the province of Ontario.

I know Mr. Davis continues to regard me as philosophically misguided, as he would put it, but nevertheless our friendship remains very strong. I have great admiration for his sense of occasion and his sense of critical times in the life of the province. He was not simply going to exercise partisan advantage in order to achieve something. He was going to be doing something on behalf of all the people of the province. No issue reflected this more significantly than the question of election financing.

I could tell a similar story about the changes in the federal law and the federal rules, the decision by Prime Minister Chrétien to make a very significant change, which was carried through. It is notable, for example, that the proclamation of the date of that change was delayed so it would not negatively impact a leadership contest then under way in the Conservative Party of Canada. That was, again, an example of someone saying, “Let's recognize that we're not going to take advantage of this to simply punish a party which is now undergoing a political battle”.

I entered the contest for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada under a certain set of rules. Those rules were not made by me. They were not written by me. They had nothing to do with me in a sense. They were passed by the Parliament of Canada. I assumed those rules would apply to the leadership contest, which I was entering, for the full time of that contest.

I do not say this directly when I look at my friends, including my colleagues who are here from the Conservative Party and my friends from the New Democratic Party and the Bloc.

I became a candidate under legislation approved by the Parliament of Canada and very clear rules. The rules said that there was a $5,400 limit on individual contributions and that the contributions could be made up to 18 months after the convention. The law was very clear, unequivocal and transparent, and it was passed by the Parliament of the day.

To put it mildly, I and a number of other leadership candidates were shocked. It woke me up to how the new government plays the game of politics. In the middle of the period in which we were raising money for the leadership and engaged in the leadership race itself, the Conservatives changed the law in such a way that for the entire 18 month period after the convention we were no longer allowed to collect cheques of $5,400. We were only allowed to collect cheques of $1,100.

I want to tell everyone in this chamber and anyone else who wants to listen that there is no other interpretation that one can give to that unilateral change, joined in by the Bloc and approved and egged on by the New Democratic Party. There is no other way to interpret the timing of that law and the fact that it was not grandfathered for those who were participating in the leadership contest. There is no other way to interpret that law but as a deliberate attempt to undermine the credibility and integrity of the Liberal Party of Canada and to cause personal difficulty and embarrassment for each person who ran for the leadership of the Liberal Party of Canada. It was a deliberate and flagrant attack on our political process in which we had all entered in terms of that race.

The member for Cambridge is laughing. Let him laugh because for him to change the rules in the middle of the game is just a laughing matter.

[Gary Goodyear]

You were taking money from kids, Bob.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

I will say to the hon. member that if we are on the other side, I hope we will not do what they have done to us. To change the contribution limits, when people ran campaigns on the assumption that financing would be possible, and then to change those rules and those limits in the middle of the game when we had all taken the personal risk that we take when we go into a leadership race, is simply disgraceful. I must confess that it has affected, for all time, my view of what the party opposite is really all about. I think I now understand what it is all about, what it is trying to do to us and what it is trying to do to the democratic process.

The Conservatives can shout down, heckle and comment any way they want but I will not be cowed nor bullied by them into not stating what I know to be the truth. The government opposite interfered in this process because it had a political agenda. That is what it is all about. There is no way that anyone in his or her right mind would support the government in any effort it makes with respect to the project that is now under way with Bill C-29 and the statements it is making about the current law with respect to Elections Canada.

The member opposite is not sitting in his chair and I am not sure he is allowed to heckle from anywhere in the House.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

If you're going to heckle--

[The Acting Speaker, Derek Lee]

Order, please. A little more order would assist all colleagues in getting through this debate.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to deal with a couple of arguments that have been made.

My colleague from Winnipeg Centre just made a comment about the importance of using banks rather than individuals to make loans. I have no particular problem with that amendment to the act. It does not affect things one way or the other.

However, the one comment he made, which he needs to think about, is when he said that it would take big money out of politics, which means that anybody could gain access to the same amount of money. The hon. member needs to think realistically about what security banks will be asking for with respect to getting a loan and what that really means.

If the member is saying that this would take big money out, I would say that it does not. However, if the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre wants to take the money factor out of a leadership race entirely, the one way in which it can be done is to apply the philosophy in the Elections Act to leadership races, which is to say that there should be, as there is in the United States, public contributions for leadership races just as there are public contributions for our own campaigns at the national level.

Speaking, I hope, in a less partisan fashion at this moment, if I were to make a practical suggestion to the House, having gone through this race, and I do not say this with any sense of pride, having managed to get through a very extensive process of begging and pleading with friends and people who used to be friends and getting them to make contributions, there is one flaw in the legislation. When my friends in the Conservative Party, the New Democratic Party or the Bloc Québécois have a leadership race they will all have the same experience we did.

They will have to deal with the same circumstances and challenges as us. They will see that if a party wants to conduct a nation-wide campaign, if that party wants its campaign to reach every riding in this great land, that costs money. If the funds do not come from our families, from personal sources, and from contributors, and if they want a democratic campaign, then I believe there has to be more public funding for leadership races, just like there is for political parties.

With all due respect, I wanted to focus on two points about this change. The first is that it is not fair to change the rules in the middle of the game. That is not fair. They can do it, and they have even done it twice now, but it is not fair, and I have to say that. This is an example of injustice toward a political party. If they want to punish a political party, they can. But if they start playing that kind of game, it could have some negative consequences.

The second point I really want to make is about an important reform that has not been proposed in this bill: public funding. I am not talking about full funding, but a contribution from the public for leadership campaigns. I hope that will be in place before the next Bloc Québécois, NDP or Conservative Party leadership race because I think it is important for the Canadian democratic process.

That is all I have to say, and I appreciate the opportunity to take part in this debate.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Toronto Centre for a very informative speech. It is the kind of speech I myself would have given if I were looking forward to contesting a leadership race in the next year or so and was going to rely upon a large amount of donated cash.

I want to talk about a couple of things. One is the idea that Jean Chrétien was being fair and thoughtful when he put forward this finance legislation. We should be clear about what was going on. The legislation that was put forward would have gone into effect, although the Chief Electoral Officer had some discretion on it, on December 31, 2003. Any race that might be underway could be declared to go before or after. The Chief Electoral Officer chose to cause the old financing rules with unlimited donations and unlimited spending to apply.

That was not done out of fairness. That was done to ensure the member for Newmarket—Aurora, who at that point was running for the leadership of the Conservative Party, would have a huge advantage over the current Prime Minister in that leadership race. It was a complete abuse of process and no one should misunderstand what was going on on that occasion.

With regard to the fairness of the underlying system, there was nothing fair about the process that Jean Chrétien proposed of providing public financing on a sliding scale based on how many votes one got in the previous election, thereby locking in the advantage of the governing party; $1.75 per year to each party per vote it received in the previous election. Regardless of how voters might feel in the future, there is nothing fair about that. It locks in an incumbent's advantage. The longer the next Parliament lasts, the bigger the advantage adds up to be and the larger the number of votes a party has the bigger the advantage.

What was fair about that as compared to what Ed Broadbent proposed where one would have the ability to indicate where one's particular subsidy would go based upon one's ongoing preferences? That was a much fairer suggestion which was shot down by the Liberals at that time.

Similarly, the rebate of 60% of expenses to candidates, rewards those who are able to spend more. What is fair about that? What about this does not have the effect of benefiting those who have the most to spend and the most ability to borrow?

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Now that the hon. member has completed his comments, I just want to say that we were admonished in the House yesterday for straying beyond the scope of this third reading of Bill C-29. We were admonished in part because of two or three points of order from the parliamentary secretary. I am suggesting that the comments here go way outside of the contents of the bill we are now debating at third reading.

I am just asking that the government members subscribe to the same rules that their member urged upon the House yesterday.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I thank the hon. member for Scarborough—Rouge River but I think the hon. member for Toronto Centre is ready to make a response, in any event, to the comments so I will call upon him at this point to make his response.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments from my friend from Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington.

If we were to go back to the Camp report, we would find the basis upon which the two principles that were applied to the Liberal legislation were there. That is the first one was with respect to using the last election as the basis upon which to document the public contributions because it is an objective basis. It is a basis of what the support was in an election, a democratic contest in which people have expressed themselves. That is just the reality. Would there be another way of doing it? Yes, I suppose there would be but that is one objective criterion.

If we look at other countries in terms of how public funding is allocated, it is the same principle applied, which is that the level of public funding depends upon the level achieved in a democratic process. The same is true with respect to the contributions. None of these things are fixed for all time.

If the member opposite is saying that the government would like to look at those contributions and at the legislation overall, I would invite the government, instead of bringing in these little amendments here and there, which are designed to appeal to one party on the other side or not and give a temporary advantage, to put the subject matter of election financing in front of an all party committee and let us have an agreement that we will not see this as a partisan issue.

I really do not see this as a partisan issue nor do I see it as a personal issue. I have done my bit and I have no personal issues. I am not here out of any personal gripe. I am here because I think what has animated the government is a desire for temporary political advantage.

I do not know whether that has animated other governments in the past or not. I only know what I see and I think that is a very unhealthy feature. It is a perfect example of how not to reform the election financing process. The election financing process should be something in which all political parties can be seen to be participating and there is no particular advantage to one party or another. That is an approach that I would strongly advocate for now and certainly advocate for the future.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to ask for unanimous consent for the following: “That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, at the end of debate on Bill C-474, standing in the name of the member for Don Valley West, all report stage motions be deemed adopted, the bill be deemed concurred in at report stage with further amendments, and be deemed read a third time and passed”.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is there unanimous consent?

[Some hon. members]

No.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to speak to Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), especially since the Bloc Québécois is in favour of nearly the entire bill. We would have liked to make certain amendments, but they were not approved. I will mention them in my speech.

It is important to keep in mind that, ever since it arrived in this House, the Bloc Québécois has been fighting to put an end to corporate funding and limit individual contributions, as Quebec did 30 years ago.

Earlier, I listened as the Liberal member for Toronto Centre talked about his leadership race, the difficulty of getting funding, and so on. Quebec has had legislation in place for 30 years. In Quebec, political parties successfully hold leadership races, raise funds and run election campaigns, all without corporate funding or huge contributions from individuals

That is where the problem lies. With Bill C-2, An Act providing for conflict of interest rules, restrictions on election financing and measures respecting administrative transparency, oversight and accountability, the Conservative Party tried to correct the situation. The Conservatives were in a hurry. They had just been elected and had promised transparency and accountability legislation. We remember this bill.

We warned them at the time about their Bill C-2. And we were not alone. Democracy Watch, an organization made up of democracy experts, also pointed to problems in the bill. Obviously, among the problems are the famous loans. Even if individual contributions are limited to $1,100 a year, this is not an improvement if individuals can make loans to get around the law. That is very worrisome.

I will say it again. Earlier, I was listening to the speech by the Liberal member for Toronto Centre, a candidate in his party's leadership race, who told us it was unfair. Before it was reduced to $1,100 per individual, the contribution limit stood at $5,400 per individual and corporations were allowed a separate amount. He finds the bill to be unfair. However, he is one of the members who received a loan from an individual. His brother, among others, lent him $400,000. This is just as unfair as individuals being able to contribute $5,400 or $1,100 to a leadership or other campaign and getting around the limit by saying that the limit does not apply if the money is given as a loan.

That is what Bill C-29 seeks to remedy. In law, there is a principle that ignorance of the law is no excuse. However, there is also a principle that you cannot do indirectly what cannot be done directly. That is an argument we raised with the Conservative government with respect to its Bill C-2.

It is a good thing to adopt a limit of $1,100 for individuals and to prohibit corporations from contributing to election campaigns. That is perfect. It is similar to Quebec's law. However, we should not allow loans that would permit individuals to do indirectly what cannot be done directly. If the contribution limit is $1,100 per individual, tomorrow morning we cannot say to an individual that the limit does not apply, that he can lend hundreds of thousand of dollars and that it is not a problem if he makes it a loan. He could declare that it is a loan and that the means will be found to repay it.

Today, it is understandable that the Leader of the Opposition—the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville—and the member for Toronto Centre have not been able to repay the debts incurred to participate in the leadership race. Nor should Canadians be fooled. I know that the Chief Electoral Officer did not make public the agreement he had with the leadership candidates; however they have not yet repaid their debts.

I repeat, the hon. member for Toronto Centre said earlier that he has run in several provincial election campaigns and that he was a party leader in Ontario. He also said that anyone who runs in a leadership race will have funding problems.

Perhaps he had a problem. He was in the NDP and became a Liberal. I understand why many Liberal supporters might not have wanted to contribute to his election campaign. Perhaps he chose the wrong party. Only time will tell, but, during a leadership race and an election, the individuals involved must be reliable and obey the law. In other words, candidates must be able to raise enough money from enough supporters to campaign responsibly in an election, and the same goes for a leadership race.

It forces the people who want to become party leaders to expand their circle of supporters. If they are unable to bring in more supporters, they might as well stay at home. It is not complicated. It is as simple as that. If a leadership candidate estimates that it will cost $500,000, he or she needs 500 people to contribute $1,000 each. And any candidate who cannot do so does not deserve to run in the leadership race. That is it.

In my view, it only makes sense and shows respect for individuals, and it prevents one individual or group of individuals from being able to control a candidate in a leadership race or an election. It is only logical, simple and honest, and it also means that anyone can hope to enter politics one day. They must understand that, in order to run an election campaign, candidates must have people who trust them and they must be able to raise between $80,000 and $100,000. Thus, one must be able to raise funds, like I do and like all Bloc members do.

Indeed, we use public financing—spaghetti dinners and suppers, sugar shacks and so on—and some 100, 200 or 300 people come out and generously give us $20. That is how, over the years, we are able to raise funds. That is why Bloc Québécois members, like the Conservatives, are probably among those with the best backing. We also probably receive the most money from individual contributors, men and women who are thrilled to come to a Bloc Québécois fundraising activity and give $20, knowing that $7 or $8 will go towards funding, depending on the cost of the meal.

With these small amounts of money, we can raise funds for an election campaign. It is simple. I can understand that the Liberals and Conservatives are not used to that, since for them, it is clearly the “establishment”, only a few individuals, that has run the party. These people were able to make some very large contributions.

So I am not surprised. What surprises me most, is that the member for Toronto Centre, a former member of the Ontario NDP, was also collecting money from some individuals. He was not used to grassroots fundraising, which surprises me about a former NDP member.

In this House, surprises are not uncommon. Every day, the Conservatives bring us revelation after revelation. It is clear that the way the Conservatives wanted to govern is looking more and more like the way the Liberals were running things. I can see that the NDP had a way of running things that is similar to the Liberals' and the Conservatives' way. Regardless, that is the problem of the federalist parties in this House. It is not the problem of the Bloc Québécois, which is used to grassroots financing.

The members of the Bloc Québécois worked very hard to get Bill C-29 passed. Why? Because in Quebec, for 30 years, grassroots fundraising has dominated, since René Lévesque, the leader of the Parti Québécois, implemented election legislation that prevents lobbyists from controlling politics. This legislation completely changed politics in Quebec. It ensures that politics must be supported by fundraising among the public.

If an individual is not able to get funding to run a campaign from the largest possible number of individual men and women, he or she does not deserve to be in power. That is what I would tell the Liberals, in particular the member for Toronto Centre, who was offended that the amount for individual contributions was reduced in the middle of the race. Except that, thanks to the $400,000 loan he received from his brother, he did not need funding.

He needs it now, because he had 18 months to repay his debt. He was counting on the $5,400 per person that he was allowed to collect. But along the way, the $5,400 became $1,100.

I can understand that it is hard for him to find Liberal supporters to pay off his campaign debt, because he is not a real Liberal.

In some ways, it is disappointing that not everyone in this House realizes that politics should be open to every man and woman, to every citizen. It is not a matter of money, friends or anything like that. It takes someone who is able to express their ideas and defend them, someone that many people around them or in their party are able to trust.

That is how we should run elections and that is how the Bloc Québécois does it. We convince hundreds and thousands of people to become members of our organization and to make donations to enable us to run election campaigns based on defending the values and interests of Quebec. That is why, once again, as in election to election since 1993, our party has the most representatives from Quebec in this House. It is precisely because we are always in contact with the public, with the people we represent. We call on them for financing and it takes a great number of supporters, people who can trust us, to build up the money for our election campaigns.

The other parties will probably have to follow our example. Quebec is often a model of innovation for the rest of Canada, as hon. members know. One such innovation came from René Lévesque and was included in the electoral legislation that he was responsible for over 30 years ago. It bans corporate donations and limits individual donations.

This bill is the logical next step to what we sovereignists in Quebec defend. In politics, we have to be able to convince as many people as possible. The best way to do so is to limit individual contributions. We cannot allow a dozen or so people to give us $10,000 each to enable us to run an election campaign. We have to broaden our network.

When the Conservatives passed Bill C-2, we told them that, if individuals may not invest more than $1,100 in an election campaign annually, we absolutely cannot allow them to do so indirectly by handing out loans. That is why the Conservatives have amended that in Bill C-29. We cannot prohibit people from making donations greater than $1,100, while allowing them to lend as much money as they want and saying this is just fine. This bill corrects that.

We demanded—and we obtained this amendment at second reading of Bill C-29—that political parties not be liable for their candidates' debts. Obviously, be it an election campaign, a leadership race or a personal election campaign, it is not right that a political party be held responsible for debts that a candidate may have contracted with banks or otherwise and not from individuals.

The Conservatives decided to reverse course, with the NDP's support. That is why I find it difficult to understand the NDP. It sees itself as a grassroots party but has, I believe, a hard time fundraising. This party now has the Conservatives' support to withdraw the amendment that we presented. That means that henceforth a political party would be responsible for its candidates' debts to financial institutions, if ever they were not paid back.

Once again, when people run as candidates, they must be able to prove that they can find sufficient support. Therefore, it is normal that if a candidate borrows from a financial institution to fund an election campaign, that candidate is responsible because it is their election campaign. Under this bill, parties would be required to cover any unpaid debts.

This means that the people who run as candidates might not necessarily be the best. They would not need popular support. They would not need to fundraise to reimburse their debts. Inevitably, they would only have to run as candidates, knowing full well that if they do not raise enough money, the party will pay off their debt.

I will say it again: the Bloc Québécois was against this position. That is why we proposed amendments. It is difficult to understand why the Conservatives did not agree to them. Perhaps they also have trouble with grassroots fundraising in individual ridings. They are better at collecting money as the party in power. We see it with the Couillard affair in Quebec, the Kevlar situation concerning land in Quebec City that Ms. Couillard apparently pushed for. Basically, we can understand that much of the money going into the coffers comes from the way in which the Conservatives engage in politics, which means that they probably have difficulty with grassroots fundraising.

Of course, that is not the Bloc Québécois' case. We are proud to say that every day, we rise in this House to defend the interests and values of Quebeckers. We do not need to be in power to do that. Citizens are the ones who give us real power. The only power we should be able to accept is the power entrusted to us by the people. The people can take it away whenever they want because it does not belong to us. The people lend us power, and we are here every day to stand up for the people.

I have a hard time every time I see a Quebec Conservative rise and say something that is not in line with the interests and values of Quebeckers. That is what has been happening with the EDC file. The Minister of Labour and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec, the minister responsible for the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean region, typically takes a stance that opposes what was passed unanimously. It gets even worse. Quebec's minister of regional development, Mr. Bachand, is engaged in an open war with the Minister of Labour because at some point, the latter decided that he no longer respected the Quebec consensus on economic development.

Quebec's non-profit organizations are our way of diversifying our economy and giving certain responsibilities to non-political organizations that exist not to engage in politics, but to work on community development, to make decisions about what kinds of businesses and economic interventions are needed in each region. The Minister of Labour and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec decided that the government would no longer fund these organizations, would no longer help them. He decided that he would make direct payments instead.

That is very hard to accept. I can see how he might have trouble getting grassroots funding from the people after taking such a position in the House. All of the other Conservative members from Quebec support him. This kind of policy is contrary to the values and interests of Quebeckers. I can see that they are getting more and more out of touch. Raising funds is getting harder and harder for them. Nevertheless, the law must not permit impunity.

Once again, we had hoped that the Conservatives would understand that it is not up to the party to repay a debt incurred by a candidate. Especially since the party now receives $2 per voter, which means that the candidate's debt will be paid by our citizens because that $2 contribution to the political party comes from the government. It would be taxpayers' money repaying candidates' debts.

The Bloc Québécois would never have accepted such a situation. We would never have allowed taxpayers' money to repay an election debt. That is what the Conservative Party has done with the help of the NDP. I have a great deal of difficulty with this, especially coming from the NDP, which calls itself the champion of the people and of the people's interests.

I have a great deal of difficulty with the idea of allowing taxes—through a $2 per taxpayer contribution to political parties—to be used to repay a candidate's debt. The candidate would no longer have to fundraise because he or she would think, “If I ever go into debt, then the party will automatically pay it back out of the money provided by the government.” I have a great deal of difficulty understanding that. But, once again, it is typical of the NDP to signal that they are turning left and then turn right. They always do that. I see that they decided to turn right with the Conservatives. They will have to suffer the consequences and live with that decision in the next election.

Obviously, we will support Bill C-29. We wanted our amendment—that would not permit a candidate's debt to be repaid by the party, given that the contribution of $2 per voter is paid by the government—to be adopted. We would have liked that amendment to pass. However, once again, the Conservatives and the NDP decided to oppose it. As for the Bloc Québécois, we will always respect the interests of Quebeckers.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans).

Over the last number of years since 2003, we have seen a series of pieces of legislation and amendments to legislation dealing with the whole issue of election funding and financing. These pieces of legislation have attempted to provide transparency in our electoral process and prevent undue influence. Those are the two component parts.

Both parts are extremely important. Not only should the democratic process be transparent, but it also has to be a process that does not allow undue influence.

I wish to clarify where the differentiation is between those two elements. For instance, we have been watching the presidential electoral process in the United States. We have heard that this process is going to be the first billion dollar presidential election.

There are many pieces of legislation and many regulations that deal with the issue of transparency, but when the people of the United States, along with many people in other countries who look to the democracies with hope, see a system that appears to be almost a “dollarocracy”, it is worrisome.

Thus, it is quite important that these pieces of legislation which we have been enacting address both of those issues so that they in fact strengthen our Canadian democracy.

Are undue influence and lack of transparency an issue, or have they been an issue, here in Canada? I would have liked to believe that these sorts of things would not happen in Canada, but in fact just this past winter and spring we saw the spectacle of the unfortunate Schreiber-Mulroney relationship.

One of the aspects that perhaps was not given enough attention was a former leadership convention, which provided Mr. Schreiber, because of a lack of transparency, with the opportunity to influence an historic outcome for this country. Offshore moneys were used to influence the outcome of a leadership campaign in one of Canada's major parties.

Quite clearly, that one example demonstrates that we need to have a transparent process. In fact, we could use another example that is a little closer in time, because at this point neither Mr. Clark nor Mr. Mulroney are in this House. They no longer occupy the political positions of power that they have in the past. However, in 2002, the current Prime Minister underwent a leadership process that was not transparent.

I would like to believe that there was no undue influence. I believe that all of us want to assume and believe that, but now, with the example of Mulroney and Schreiber, as I have said, we see that these things have happened in the past.

It begs the question of why the Prime Minister would not want to address that particular issue. I know he is not required to by law, but there is the very fact that he does not wish to come clean.

There is a higher standard that we expect of our elected officials. To have responsible government, we must have confidence in our ministers and especially in our Prime Minister, our first minister. Quite clearly, it is necessary to have laws that provide this sort of transparency.

Then there is the whole issue of undue influence. As we know, electoral processes culminate with election day when collectively we as a people gather, travel to the vote locations and cast our ballots. At the end of the day and the end of the process, the people have decided.

People decide, based upon a campaign during which they have had the opportunity to listen and to examine party platforms, whether a party leader inspires with a vision for the future and whether locally the candidates speak to the hopes, dreams and principles upon which the local communities are built and believe in.

However, we know that to communicate one's vision is not an inexpensive process. There is a cost to communicating with the public and if we are unable to communicate with the public then we undermine the democratic process.

We need the money and the resources to get out there, to meet with people and to give people a sense of who we are, where we stand as a party and where the leader wishes to take the country.

It would be tremendously unfortunate if single individuals or corporations had the ability, through donations or loans, to influence potential candidates or parties because of their ability to provide large sums of money for their campaigns. Therefore, I think there is a clear case of why we need this sort of legislation, and Canada seems to be at the forefront. It is encouraging that we have been working on this process.

However, we now need to ask whether this most recent legislation addresses those issues. Have we perhaps gone a step too far, to the point where it acts as a brake on our democratic processes, prevents individuals from putting themselves forward as candidates or as leadership candidates or prevents people who perhaps have a point of view that better fits with one of the smaller parties, such as the Green Party or other parties that are out there?

Does the legislation act in a way that is conducive to the democratic process or are we at the point where, inadvertently, or perhaps, as some would say cynically, advertently, we have begun undermining the very process?

Let us take a look at what, in this legislation, are some of the unintended consequences may be.

We are in an era right now of minority governments and, although politics are unpredictable, we can assume that over the next period of time we may be in a situation of minority governments.

When it comes to actual fundraising, we do not necessarily face a campaign every four years, providing enough time to raise, whether it is locally, the $70,000 approximately that is required for a campaign, we have a series of sequential elections in much shorter timeframes.

With a limit of $1,100 per donation, it has made it incredibly difficult for many people to step forward as candidates. For many people it has now become a barrier that prevents them from putting themselves forward. There is the question of whether $1,100 is the barrier that we should put in place or should it be $2,500, especially when it comes to leadership campaigns. It is difficult to make the argument that $1,100 is the perfect amount.

We are in a world of minority governments. We have set the barrier very high with this very low limit of $1,100, so we have forced candidates into the situation of having to go out and look for loans. This legislation proposes to put limits on where and how one could go about doing this. Unfortunately, it has a series of unintended consequences that are corrosive to the democratic process.

Each one of us here have a group of volunteers in our riding associations, tremendous people who believe in their candidates, their parties, their platforms and want to be part of the process. This legislation would entail a requirement that they provide loan guarantees to banks for loans that are necessary for election campaigns.

Many of these volunteers are not people of modest means. They are people of conviction. It would be a terrible situation if we limited the ability, not just of candidates, but the ability of people to engage in a formal manner in political parties unless they were people of modest means and willing to take on this sort of guarantee risk with financial institutions.

Probably some of the most wonderful volunteers over the years with whom I have dealt were not people of modest means but they were people of principle and character. These are the people this type of legislation would now prevent from taking part in the process. We have almost come full circle.

By wanting to ensure that big money would not have undue influence so the average Canadian, a person of conviction, could take part in the process, we are now preventing those individuals from taking part in the process. We then take the unfortunate step of saying that it is only big money, the banks, that can provide the financial loans for electoral campaigns. That is truly an undesirable consequence.

I heard my NDP colleague from Winnipeg Centre state that, from a position of principle, he supports this because it would prevent unions from providing loans, just as it would prevent corporations. It is to be lauded that he approaches this with that mind frame. However, the legislation would prevent unions and most corporations from providing loans but not banks. I am sure many members in this House have over the years been lobbied by unions. As he stated, it is an uncomfortable situation because if a union has provided members with a loan then, at some point, as legislators they would need to sit through a union presentation on particular issues of interest.

Why would we want to provide banks, which lobby in very sophisticated ways and sometimes not very transparent ways, with that additional clout?

I can imagine how difficult it might be in certain ridings where there are not a lot of bank branches, especially some of our northern ridings where perhaps someone lives in one small particular community how it would feel for a candidate to have to go to the local bank branch manager and talk about a loan. If we truly intended to address the issue of undue influence of those who would provide loans, we would have spent a little more time, instead of trying to rush this legislation, thinking it through. Perhaps we need an arm's length body whose sole purpose would be to provide loans to campaigns and not not lobby members of Parliament. It would prevent undue influence.

I have just thrown that idea out and it is something we should perhaps look at in the future. However, as I have just referenced, this seems to have moved very quickly and not truly been thought through in a collective manner where all the parties sat down, discussed it and tried to go about this in a way in which we truly could have addressed the issues of transparency and undue influence.

Unfortunately, besides the inadvertent consequences, perhaps there were some cynical reasons for this legislation. It does not inspire confidence when we see some of the past tactics that have been used by the Conservative government when it comes to this whole issue of finance. I reference the disappointing situation of not being provided with open books on the 2002 leadership campaign of the current Prime Minister. It would be tremendous if he set an example but, unfortunately, that is not forthcoming. Therefore, we take it with a grain of salt when there is such tremendous interest to pass this legislation.

We also note that the Conservative Party truly is the party of big money now because its coffers are overflowing. We should note that the parties have the ability to provide loans to their various candidates. We often talk about democratic deficit in this House and how members of Parliament have been diminished in their role because of the strength of the central party apparatus, the so-called party backroom boys, and this has just provided another lever to ensuring there is limited independence of thought.

What we note here is that there are parties which virtually do not have an ability to provide that sort of financing. I mentioned the Green Party earlier. It does not have the same sort of resources and there are other parties, other points of view. I can imagine how difficult it would be for those particular candidates, from those parties, when it came time to get their executive together, to walk over to the local bank branch manager and to convince him or her that at some point in time they would have the ability to repay the loans required to run a $70,000 campaign.

There appears to be even more cynicism in this because we see and have heard on tape the Prime Minister reference how two high-powered backroom operators within the Conservative Party approached a potential candidate with financial considerations. It does not inspire confidence in this particular piece of legislation brought forward by a government whose party's head office potentially engages in those sorts of activities and a Prime Minister who is not willing to come forward with his own leadership campaign details.

Many have insinuated that big oil and gas perhaps provided financing for that particular campaign. I just cannot imagine why the Prime Minister would not want to put to rest those sorts of insinuations, a Prime Minister who talks about accountability so often would want to be transparent to set an example.

People say that was in the past and that these cannot be done retroactively. Of course, but he could also set an example, show true leadership, especially on these issues and especially in this era when we have heard of things that we could never have imagined half a year ago. Once again, I would like to reference how Mr. Mulroney's relationship with Mr. Schreiber and the leadership convention undermined our electoral processes here in the country.

In conclusion, there are tremendously negative and corrosive inadvertent consequences to this particular piece of legislation and it does the exact opposite of its stated intention.

[John Maloney, Liberal, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member referenced the current Prime Minister's leadership campaign expenses. Although he is aware that it was not legally required at the time, and although he has been asked many times to disclose those expenses and donations, he has declined to do so.

With suggestions of rumours and innuendo he might wish to clear that up and also show leadership in the spirit of this current legislation. Could the member offer any reason why he would not want to comply with the recommendation that he provide public transparency and show his expenses and donations?

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is puzzling, but more than just puzzling, it is disturbing.

As I already mentioned, the public expects a higher standard of its elected officials, of its public servants, and the terminology is public servant. We are here to serve the public. That is why the very process that brought us here should be transparent.

Mr. Schreiber, a lobbyist for an arms company, did not just attempt to influence, but he actually did have an influence on the final outcome of the leadership of a party. It makes the case that the Prime Minister should be the one setting the standard, and the standard that we expect is higher of our first minister, among all ministers, especially in the recent situation of scandal after scandal. We would all hate to assume the worst.

We would hate to think that big oil and gas could have influenced a leadership campaign, could have influenced a decision to get rid of the Kyoto accord. I do not want to assume that, but the only way we could clarify that situation would be for the Prime Minister to come clean. Why has he not?

It is absolutely perplexing for all of us in the know. Unfortunately, Canadians do not know. The Prime Minister has every intention of keeping Canadians in the dark so that they will not know.

I would like to believe that our democratic processes, our policies, our legislation, are not being undermined due to undue influence by the corrosive influence of big money. The only way to address this would be for the current sitting Prime Minister to come clean. He has been asked many times and people will continue to have questions. There is only one way he can address these questions. He could rise to the occasion and open up the books. If he does not do that, those questions will linger.

[Derek Lee, Liberal, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we all accept the principle of transparency here and to the extent that this legislation imposes or extends it. That is fine. Does my colleague not think that the measures imposed with the additional prohibitions would potentially straitjacket the political process? Is there some chance that, in the government's fear of the Liberal Party of Canada, it has approached this legislation in a way that would restrict legitimate, registered, political parties in Canada who have not managed to elect members to the House yet? There are approximately half a dozen parties I am referring to. Does my colleague think these restrictions are totally unnecessary and arguably unfair, and maybe unconstitutional, simply because the Conservatives have been blinded by either their dislike or their fear of the Liberal Party?

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is quite clear to anyone who has listened to this debate that this, in fact, is the case, notwithstanding the name of the legislation or how it is preambled. The legislation deals with accountability with respect to loans.

We have heard members of the Conservative Party, the backbench members, refer often to the current Prime Minister's Office as the Kremlin. However, we never thought that they would go so far as to engage in doublespeak, and that is exactly what is taking place here.

The title, the preamble, speaks to something which is the exact opposite of what the outcome of the legislation would be. It would straitjacket. And it would not just straitjacket and prohibit individuals but, as the member pointed out, parties.

We would now have a limited spectrum of political debate in this country. Smaller parties would not have the capacity to jump through these hoops to provide them with the resources necessary to communicate their particular visions, whether we agree with them or not, or their particular platforms.

This is an issue of fundamental democracy. It is not just parties but, as I already referenced, individual members. Some of the best that we have in our country, some of the best among our people, are those who volunteer. They expend a tremendous amount of time volunteering their time for NGOs, but they also believe in democratic principles, the fundamentals of our country, and they want to have input in the process, and some of them take active interest; that is, they join executives.

This would dampen people's ability to do that because they would have to provide guarantees for loans from the bank. The candidates, potentially, and they would not want to do that I am sure, could walk away from these outstanding loans. Let us remember, we are in a situation of minority government, where we could have election after election, and these are not inexpensive processes. We would saddle well-meaning volunteers with loan guarantees to our big banks.

My goodness. Why would we give that sort of power to big banks, a corporate sector, and a very particular corporate sector? And why would we remove the little guy from being able to be part of the process?

If we take a look at the scales in this case, this particular piece of legislation has just given tremendous influence and weight to a portion of our corporate sector, the banking sector, and taken away the ability to influence the democratic process from individuals who are not people of modest means, and smaller parties who would like to have the opportunity to put their points of view across.

It is a terrible piece of legislation. It should not have been rushed through. It should have been thought through. I hate to have to say this, but it appears that this particular legislation is a cynical attempt to freeze in a particular advantage of one particular party at this point in time. It is a tremendous disservice to anyone who believes in a democratic process.

As has been stated over and over, the Liberal Party is against this piece of legislation. We will stand up for the small people in this country.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to debate Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans).

There are aspects of the bill which I support. In fact, when it returned from committee, the bill had been amended in such a fashion that I might have been unable to support it at third reading. Unfortunately, the government, with the help of the NDP, undid three very sensible amendments which would have improved the bill. It remains a mystery to us why the NDP members would want to sidle up with the Reform Conservative movement in Canada today. I still think that they have to justify to their supporters and Canadians at large why they might undermine this progressive piece of legislation.

As a result of those amendments and the NDP support of the government, and for many reasons, I will not be able to give Bill C-29 my support on the vote at third reading.

The majority of the bill comes from recommendations in a report from the Chief Electoral Officer to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. That, by the way, would be the same Chief Electoral Officer, a highly accomplished lifetime public servant whom the government derided because of its own legislation dealing with veiled voting. However, we will leave that for another debate.

In that report the Chief Electoral Officers found that when loans are given to a political candidate by a person who is not regularly in the business of lending money, it can be perceived by some as a means to influence the political process with money. The report made a series of recommendations to end this perception. All of us, I think, want to see that perception eliminated in Canadian society. We want to drive up trust in our democratic institutions and processes, not drive it down.

One such recommendation was to ensure that all loans granted to a candidate were signed at the going commercial lending rate. A second was to establish a limit on loans made by individuals that would be equal to their annual political contribution amount. If we look at the year 2007, for example, that amount was $1,100. These measures are contained in Bill C-29.

The bill will also ensure that corporations and unions are prevented from making loans to political candidates and parties, just as they have been prevented from making campaign contributions, a theme I will come back to in a moment.

Bill C-29 will ensure if an individual lends and donates money to any candidate that the sum total of his or her contributions and loans will count toward his or her maximum. For instance, a person will not be able to make a $1,000 loan and a $1,000 donation.

Yet another important recommendation made by the Chief Electoral Officer was that the information surrounding any loans be made public. Why? In order to mitigate the chances of a perceived conflict of interest, something that all of us as parliamentarians must fight against, again with the higher public interest in mind, that is, to drive up trust in democratic institutions and the democratic processes that bring us here.

According to the report, the information to be disclosed should include the identity of the lender, the interest rate, and a repayment schedule for the loan, over what period of time, how much, with a beginning, a middle and an end to the schedule. The reason it is important to disclose this type of information throughout a campaign is that after a vote, while the information may be telling, it comes too late to help a voter make an informed decision about which candidate he or she may choose to support or not.

I can support this measure in Bill C-29. It is the right thing to do.

In fact, for Canadians watching or reading Hansard at some point, let me take a moment to remind them it is the Liberal Party of Canada that was well ahead of the curve on this issue.

During the last Liberal leadership race, our leadership candidates went way above and beyond the call of duty to disclose this type of information. It is an excellent idea. I strongly believe that the other parties in the House should be brought under the same type and level of scrutiny that the Liberal Party of Canada has voluntarily adopted.

We have heard from numerous speakers this afternoon and throughout this debate specifically about the Prime Minister. It is revealing. It is more than interesting. It is not somewhat passing that the Prime Minister has not yet revealed the names of the people and organizations that contributed to his leadership campaign in 2002. Why? Why would a leadership candidate not want to reveal the people and organizations supporting, in this case, his leadership bid? This kind of secrecy is exactly what leads many Canadians to become distrustful of the political process.

Who exactly, they might ask, put the Prime Minister at the helm of the Conservative Party? Who? Who wrote the cheques? Which Conservative members? Was it the big oil companies? An objective Canadian might ask, is this why the Prime Minister continues to deny the existence of climate change? When faced with one of the greatest ecological threats of our time, in the wake of the loss of 2,500 of the highest paying jobs in the manufacturing sector in Canada, how does the Prime Minister respond? How does he respond to the climate change crisis facing the planet? With a talking oil stain that tells Canadians there is no point in trying to curb our greenhouse gas emissions.

It is actually encouraging. I encourage the Prime Minister and his party to pursue exactly those kinds of tactics. I encourage him to run those advertisements at every gas pump in every service station in the country. Why? Because Canadians would then see that the response to the climate change crisis by the Prime Minister is a cartoon character. I ask him to please go forward in that regard and continue to proliferate those kinds of race to the bottom tactics.

Was he funded, for example, by groups like Charles McVety's at the Canada Christian College, who was recently in Ottawa to help the government push through Bill C-10? That bill would give the Conservative government the right to censor Canadian films based on whatever they seem to find offensive.

Or is it the same Charles McVety who actually cybersquatted on over 40 MPs websites, including my own? Having seized it, he was confronted by me, and was shamed into actually transferring mine back to me and the others back to the other members from all sides of the House, all parties? Dr. McVety, whatever his doctorate might be in, was opposed to the notion of same sex civil marriage and he used cyber theft and cybersquatting as his modus operandi to achieve his objectives. Is this the group that funded the Prime Minister's leadership bid?

We should know those things. If either of these are the case, I believe that Canadians deserve an answer. They have a right to know. I encourage my colleagues on the Conservative side of the House to urge their leader to disclose those contributions as quickly as possible.

While they are at it, why do they not ask the Minister of National Defence which sole contributor paid off up to half a million dollars of his leadership debt. One cheque, one donor, the amount has never been disclosed. The Minister of National Defence has never come clean with Canadians.

It is no surprise that some of the measures we find in this bill are supported by the Conservatives.

Those are two examples and there may be more. That is exactly the kind of transparency the House should be seeking to increase, not decrease, to drive up trust in the democratic institutions and the processes that brought us here.

I understand that members in the Conservative Party are not allowed to question their leader or even to express their own ideas, failing which we see the kind of despicable content which has emerged in the last 48 hours from the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board. On that note, we know the apology is not enough. It is not enough because it is not the first time.

This is about restoring the faith of Canadians in the democratic process. Over the past five years the Liberal Party has done tremendous work, I believe, to help restore faith. It was in 2003 that the previous Liberal government introduced the very first annual limits on individual contributions to a political party and to our candidates. In that same bill we also banned contributions from corporations and unions to political parties. That is progressive. Those changes stand today as the most significant ones that have been made to political financing at the federal level in decades. We went further.

In 2006 the maximum contribution amounts were lowered even further. They are now tied to the rate of inflation and in theory should rise slightly each year. I say “in theory” because we have yet to see if Canada's Minister of Finance will be able to steer the economy well enough to meet targeted inflation rates. Given his past behaviour at Queen's Park and his performance in the Ontario government, Canadians are of course deeply suspicious of an individual who increases provincial debt by $28 billion and leaves a $5.6 billion deficit in Canada's largest province.

Nevertheless, we did support lowering those maximums, which brings me to the part of my speech where I have to raise my concerns about this bill. There is a danger that sometimes we, as legislators, in our zeal to make things better, often make things worse through a variety of unintended consequences.

This bill, unfortunately, finds itself well across the line of what is needed in order to make things better. To their credit, the members from all sides of the House who studied the bill at committee stage tried to make the bill better. At least in this case it was not one of the six standing committees that have been filibustered, blocked, toyed with and brought into disrepute by the conduct of Conservative members, most recently of course in a number of standing committees with respect to their cheap and dishonest talk about carbon pricing.

The members who studied the bill did try to make the bill better. There were, however, three amendments made at committee which the government did not agree with and which were eliminated at report stage, again with the help of the NDP. It is a shame because it was widely recognized that these amendments would have improved the bill.

One such amendment has to do with who is liable for loans that go unpaid. The Bloc and the Liberal members of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs were concerned that the original wording of the bill could have made political parties responsible for loans that their candidates took without even knowing that their candidates had taken those loans. Let me give an example.

The local candidate takes out a $30,000 loan to finance his campaign. He does not inform the central Conservative Party that he is doing this. The central party, however, is now responsible for that loan should the candidate not win and declare bankruptcy. That is right; a political party would not have authorized the loan, would have had no knowledge of the loan, yet it would be required to assume liability for the loan if the candidate declared bankruptcy.

I do not think this is right. I actually do not even think it is legal, particularly when we consider that there are parties not represented in this House and for whom a $30,000 debt is an extremely high sum of money to be stuck with through no fault of their own. In short, this is not good for democracy. It does not give rise to the possibility of new political parties, for example.

That brings me to my last point. It is about who will be disenfranchised by Bill C-29. Every single politician cuts his or her teeth in politics by taking a chance and running for office. From a local councillor to a federal cabinet minister, we all start that way; everyone except, of course, for the Minister of Public Works, whom the Prime Minister appointed to the Senate and who, in his own words, did not feel like running for office.

I will admit that in mounting a campaign for office some people will have advantages. They might have a recognizable name or face because of their past activities. There is nothing wrong with that, but it does give them an early advantage in getting the early stage donations that are so crucial to a candidacy.

Others come to politics with a good amount of money in their bank accounts. That is neither a good thing nor a bad thing. Any political bodies should be represented by a broad spectrum of the citizens who vote them there. The advantage that these types of candidates will have, however, is that it will be far easier for them to secure loans from a financial institution to get their candidacy up and running. If they have a big house or other assets to use as collateral against a loan, the banks will be all too willing to give them that loan.

Banks and financial institutions, of course, are the only places where federal political candidates will be allowed to secure loans for over $1,100 if Bill C-29 passes. That would be for a nomination campaign, a leadership campaign or an election campaign.

Then there is a third type of politician, one who runs for office without a lot of face recognition and without the benefit of having much wealth tucked away. These politicians run because they want to make a difference. They believe their ideas can help to shape the national debate.

These are the candidates who would be disenfranchised by the bill. They do not have the face recognition needed to get a lot of early stage donations. They might not have the assets for a bank to give them a starter loan. In the case of a nomination battle for a riding, this could easily be the difference between launching a winning campaign and losing one.

What about family and friends? Why can family and friends not support early funding start-up for nomination battles? This is exactly what has happened, for example, in our IT sector, where so much of our IT success has come from individuals with robust ideas who have drawn from family, friends, contacts and neighbours to help start up with a positive idea. I draw a parallel here between both.

[An hon. member]

Keep Mulroney out of this.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Essentially what this bill does--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Order, please. I am sorry to interrupt the House. There are two minutes left under debate for the hon. member for Ottawa South. I see that there is much interest among members from all corners to ask questions. There will be some time for that. Please be patient.

The hon. member for Ottawa South has another two minutes.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, essentially what the bill does is further empower those people who already have influence, the influence of some amount of fame and the influence of none. Worse, it will do so at the expense of those who have neither.

This is, of course, what I think the Prime Minister wants to happen. His long time adviser and confidant, Tom Flanagan, said as much in the Globe and Mail just two weeks ago. Let me quote from the editorial:

--there would be fewer candidates. Only well-known candidates would be able to get start-up capital from banks....

Therefore, the aim of the bill, which the NDP supports--and which I find outrageous--is to ensure that only well known candidates can run for federal office. Let us look at who will find it much harder to run for office should this bill pass.

Many groups have said that women looking to run in a nomination contest would find it harder. A single mother who works to provide her kids with a decent apartment and a hopeful future will not be a prime candidate to secure a bank loan. She does not own her home or even a fancy car with which to back the loan.

She has a desire to run for office to make a difference for her kids and for millions of other Canadian children like hers. Maybe she would not be able to win. Who knows? Getting elected is not easy. But if there is one thing we as the current legislators of this House should never, ever do, it is to give even more advantages to a wealthy, well-connected individual who is also seeking that nomination or seat.

That is why I cannot support the bill at third reading. The negative consequences of the bill outnumber the positives in such a stunning manner that I cannot see how any progressive-minded politician could support it.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have one very brief question. The member says he is against it. Is he actually going to show up and vote against it?

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the question gives me a chance to again talk about some of the major reasons why this is a bad piece of legislation for the country, and although--

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, in the little time that is left today, I want to say that we cannot allow another federal election under the current election financing rules, because the loans loophole that we seek to plug by this bill is big enough to drive a Mazda truck through.

That is what I heard earlier in this debate. That is a graphic illustration of how the current regime can be abused by those who would seek to abuse it.

I would ask my colleague another very simple question. When is a loan not a loan? I will help him with the answer. A loan is not loan if it never gets repaid. It ceases to be a loan and becomes a donation, and it is an illegal donation if it is larger than $1,100.

We are seeking to rub that out. It has to be eliminated before the next federal election or we will allow the same kind of abuse, but it will even be more widespread, I would suggest, than the abuse that has already taken place in this loans loophole regime and scenario that exist now.

I cannot understand for the life of me how he fails to see that we have to take big money out of politics. Big money in election financing undermines democracies. It bastardizes democracy, so to speak, and makes it less fair for those who want to seek political office on a fair and level playing field.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if the member is so concerned about eliminating big money from politics, why is he not turning his guns on and rubbing the noses of the Prime Minister and the Minister of National Defence in it in regard to their actual undisclosed leadership campaign contributions, debts and payers?

If he is that concerned, and here is the theory about this issue, why is he not turning his party's guns on those undisclosed loans? He is not because this is about politics for the NDP. This is not about improving the status of financing in Canada. I would remind him, even though he fails to remind Canadians of this himself, that it was our government in 2003 that introduced the very first annual limits on individual contributions to a party and a candidate.

It was our party that banned contributions to political parties from corporations and his friends in the unions. Those changes stand today as the most significant at the federal level that we have ever seen in this country.

We went further in 2006. I would remind the member of that. We further lowered the amounts that were entitled to be contributions. They are now tied to the rate of inflation. In theory, they should rise only slightly each year.

Therefore, it is passing strange that the NDP is now turning its guns on the party that cleaned up election financing in the first place, while partnering with the Conservative Party, whose Prime Minister and Minister of National Defence, at the very least, have never come clean on who paid off their debts and who gave them money for their leadership races. It is high time for Canadians to know who put this Prime Minister in office, what influences is he now bearing, and how this is affecting public policy across the country.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I want to thank the hon. member for Kings—Hants for his patience. He now has the floor.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, my question for the hon. member is a very simple one on the role and power of Canadian chartered banks. The NDP members consistently attack the chartered banks as having too much power in the Canadian economic and political environment. This legislation will in fact strengthen that concentration of power.

Does the member see the potential risk? If we in fact limit these loans to chartered banks and other major financial institutions, they would have the discretionary capacity to say no to a potential leadership candidate who was perhaps opposed to bank mergers or to some of the measures that the banks want to see implemented in legislation.

In fact, they would have the capacity to say no to almost every New Democrat running for a leadership, because New Democrats are consistently against Canada's chartered banks. In fact, this legislation could entrench and strengthen the tremendous power that Canadian banks would have over the political process and the Canadian economy.

[David McGuinty, Liberal, Ottawa South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot thank my colleague from Kings—Hants enough for those insightful remarks. He is absolutely correct. NDP members are speaking out of both sides of their mouths. First they attack the big banks and now they are fighting to keep Canadian chartered banks in this, to make them more powerful, more responsible and, for that matter, more influential in political outcomes in Canadian society. They have not thought this through at all.

This is about the NDP cozying up to the Conservative Party and trying to make a cheap point. It will not resonate with Canadians, certainly not with those thousands of Canadians who do not come from fame or money and who want to be appear in elections for nominations and beyond and serve their country.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

It being 1:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

When we return to the study of Bill C-29, there will be four minutes left for questions and comments for the hon. member for Ottawa South.

The House resumed from June 13 consideration of the motion that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to the bill, as opposed to some other times when I rise in the House and really wish I did not have to speak. The bill is definitely a step forward in the reform of our democracy overall, specifically the reform we are pursuing in political financing of election campaigns, both general campaigns and leadership campaigns as well as nomination meetings.

In that regard, this type of reform has been needed for quite some period of time. Prior attempts to reform the system have been made. We saw the Federal Accountability Act passed in this current Parliament. We saw significant reforms, which I think we all applaud, in the prior parliaments of 2000 to 2004 in particular.

However, this was an area where there was a glaring loophole left. We saw that, particularly in the last leadership race by the federal Liberals. A large number of candidates took out very substantial loans to finance their campaigns, in some cases approaching as much as a million dollars, loans that were left owing when the campaign was finished. Although there are mandates to repay those loans, there is no provision of any serious consequence where the lender on the loan had opted to forgive the loan.

We can see where the huge potential for abuse can lead. In most cases, we have very clear guidelines on how much can be spent in campaigns, including leadership campaigns. This is one of the areas where we need further reform, so there is a clearer accountability of where the funds have come from and how they are spent. In fact, we need more detail in those accounting reporting functions.

However, what this left opened was people could come forward as candidates for leadership or running for the nomination in a riding association and could borrow extensive amounts of money to fund those campaigns from family or close associates, business associates perhaps. Then when the campaign was all over, the limits that we had imposed on donations, the cap we had put on donations, could be easily exceeded by the people who had advanced the loans, saying, “I understand you're in dire financial straits, I'm not going to ask you to repay the loan”.

We saw that repeatedly happen. I often wondered, even prior to some of the reporting we now have in place, how often it happened of which we were not aware.

Therefore, we are taking a significant step forward under Bill C-29. We are placing very clear guidelines on from whom funds can be borrowed, and that is primarily the lending institutions of our country, not private individuals. There are limits on how much can be borrowed as well. It is a major step forward. I do not think it is the end of the day.

I remember sitting in committee one time and listening to two delegations, one from the province of Manitoba and one from the province of Quebec. They had started the program of financial reform in political financing and political donations in particular, much ahead of where we did at the federal level. It was interesting to listen to them. In both cases they said that what we had to do was continue to monitor, at least after every election and leadership campaign, to see if some creative person had come forward with an idea, a way to get around the restrictions and legislation, which thought we had put in place and which we thought were solid and absolute,

We are seeing that to some extent in the scandal of the Conservative Party's in and out scheme, which Elections Canada clearly found improper and contrary to the legislation. That was the Conservatives' creative attempt to get around the financing laws during a federal campaign. Hopefully at the end of the day they will have their wrists severely slapped, they will be penalized, et cetera, and we will put an end to that one.

In this case, what happened with the accountability act and some of the reforms we saw under the Liberal administration was that the issue around the loans was not dealt with. We are now dealing with it in Bill C-29. I think we have covered all the bases on it, but it will require ongoing monitoring. If we do not have that, we can be almost certain that someone will figure out a way around it and we will then have to move back in as a legislature to close whatever loopholes are found.

In addition to this legislation, we have additional democratic reforms. The current Prime Minister was very strong in opposition and in both federal campaigns in arguing for all sorts of democratic reforms.

We know we need reforms within this House to deal with the decorum problem we have in this House and to deal with the problem of actually democratizing the institution. In particular, right now we can see the need to deal with democratizing our committees. We need to deal with making them stronger and more independent of the party in power in particular, but also of the leadership of the parties, so that we as members of Parliament can act more independently and also more representatively of our constituents. Those reforms are needed.

We expect that we are going to need additional reforms once we see how the Federal Accountability Act works in the next federal general election. I expect additional reforms will be called for.

There are certainly reforms that need to be made to the electoral process. As members know, the NDP has been a strong proponent for a long period of time of a form of proportional representation so that everybody's vote counts the same. This is another reform that needs to be undertaken.

The point I am trying to make here is that although this is a relatively small act, it is another step along the route we have to take, that we as members of Parliament have a responsibility to take, to see to it that as much as possible we make our country, our electoral process and our democratic institutions as absolutely democratic as possible.

Attached to this is something that one would almost say is just so obvious that we should not have to say it. There has to be accountability in the process and there has to be transparency. The average citizen has to understand how the process works, both in terms of election financing and in terms of the process here in the House and during the elections.

The point I want to make as well with regard to Bill C-29 is what we hear more about from the Liberal side of the House, which is that we really do not need this kind of restriction. We hear that we simply could put in place a regime that would set out how much money a candidate has spent, with no cap on it, and how much a candidate still owes, with all of it just being an accounting process. The accountants in the country would love that, I am sure.

All we have to do is to look to other jurisdictions to see where they have followed that type of regime. I am going to point to the United States in particular, where there are no caps on what a candidate can spend, from whom a candidate borrows, and whether a candidate pays it back. There are very few restrictions.

What we see there is that if someone wants to be a senator, for instance, he or she starts from the fact he or she is going to have to raise millions and millions of dollars to get elected. Quite literally, and I know the Americans hate it when we say this, a person can buy an election at the senate and congressional levels in the United States, because effectively there are no limits on how much one can spend.

On paper it looks like there are some limits, which goes back to the accountability. The reality is that there are none because of the political action committee fundraising methodology they employ there.

We see this even in small states. Members may remember the incident in New Jersey involving an individual who was a multi-millionaire, almost a billionaire, and who spent something like $60 million in trying to buy his senate seat. And he did win it.

He swamped the opposition with advertising, with people working door to door, and with all kinds of promotional material. He was able to use all the things that we could use if we were allowed to spend that amount of money. However, anybody who does not have access to those sources of funds, either personally or through contacts, is in a totally impossible position in regard to making the democratic process function.

It really is important that we pass Bill C-29. I believe from the comments we have heard that it obviously is going to go through.

I want to finish with the caution I heard in that committee from both the province of Quebec and the province of Manitoba. We have to be eternally vigilant.

After the next election, we will have to look at this piece of legislation. We will have to look at the Federal Accountability Act, other political financing acts and other electoral processes to see if somebody has figured out a way to get around the rules. If so, then we will have to move again to close any loopholes that have developed.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Quebecois is in favour of the bill. We believe that it will indeed plug some holes that needed plugging.

There is however one element that we put forward and that was rejected by the government with the support of the NDP. It had to do with the fact that a political party will now be liable for debts incurred by its candidates even though the party was not involved in the agreement between the candidate and his or her bank.

I find this somewhat absurd, and it is not a partisan issue. It is simply a question of financial logic. Let us take for example a candidate from any party, in any riding, who suddenly decides to spend $40,000 or signs a $40,000 loan agreement with his or her bank without informing the party. The way the bill is written, the political party will be liable for that debt. Is that not irresponsible?

Could that not be very dangerous for a party, like the NDP for instance, where out of 75 candidates in Quebec, perhaps 50 or so are basically in the running just to fill a spot and are often chosen at the last minute? Could we not see a situation where five, six or ten candidates will spend money without being liable for their debts since, under this legislation, that liability will now fall on the party?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup for his question. Our federal NDP staff have looked at this and they have come to two conclusions.

First, we have responsible candidates. They will not take out loans that could pose a problem to the federal party.

Second, and this is a really pragmatic answer, if a candidate's chances of winning are slim so will his chances of securing a loan from a bank or financial institution.

For these two reasons, we are satisfied and prepared, as a party, to accept our responsibility should it become necessary for the party to assume liability for loans taken out by individual candidates.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

To expand on the same question, Mr. Speaker, we have seen that electoral practices have been significantly cleaned up in Quebec and Canada over the past decade. That has to be recognized.

It remains possible, however, for a party to decide all of the sudden to help another party out by finding three, four or five individuals who will agree to become registered candidates for that other party, engage expenses and, ultimately, let the party assume liability and pay for those expenses. Does that not open the door to a rather dubious election strategy which will nonetheless be legal under the existing legislation?

We are talking about officially nominated candidates spending a lot of money. This could happen in three, four or five different ridings, with five candidates each spending $30,000, which would mean a $150,000 liability for the party that accepted to nominate those candidates because candidates were needed in ridings where they are hard to come by. Do we not run the risk of some scandal or another being uncovered in a couple of years from now because of the door left open in the legislation?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, once again, I thank my colleague for his question.

Encouraging a candidate to stand for election when it is not certain that they will actually be elected is not only scandalous but also unlawful.

I will put it another way. In the case of our candidate in Outremont, who won that riding in the September byelection, he spent a lot of money because he was allowed to borrow money. In fact, the banks were willing to lend him money.

However, in other situations, some Bloc, Liberal or Conservative candidates do not stand a very good chance of winning and therefore cannot borrow money from the banks. They cannot do it.

That is the simple answer.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask my colleague from Windsor a question around the whole issue of loans. We saw huge loans being given to Liberal leadership candidates by friends and businesses. Businesses that were not allowed to donate to those leadership campaigns were able to give huge loans.

My understanding at this point is that many of those loans have not yet been paid back. Some are wondering whether in fact they ever will be paid back. Could the member from Windsor tell us how this bill can correct this glaring problem in the democratic system that allows people to go beyond bank loans for their campaigns and get money from friends or businesses?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will say for my colleague from New Westminster—Coquitlam that there are some major protections in the bill. Again, as I said in my speech, I am not sure that it covers all the bases, but the major protections are there to avoid what we saw in the Liberal leadership campaign.

I think we would have seen it if we had ever received any adequate and accountable reporting from the current Prime Minister in regard to his leadership run. We will be doing away with the ability of individual candidates to borrow from individuals. Basically we are focusing in on only financial institutions being able to lend money to candidates.

Why this is important is that, again, it takes away the ability of the wealthy private sector to come in and buy a leadership or a nomination. We have a cap on what candidates can spend. Then we make sure that they do not get around the cap by taking out loans they never repay.

One of the inadequacies of the current law on the books now is that Elections Canada in effect can extend the time to repay the loans. The loans are supposed to be repaid 18 months after the fact. Elections Canada can extend that time.

Quite frankly, I am concerned that the criteria for Elections Canada to make decisions on whether it is going to allow the loans to be extended for repayment purposes are not as clear or perhaps as tight as they should be. It is one of the areas where at some point we may need to have some additional reform.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Scarborough—Guildwood for a short question.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I generally enjoy my hon. colleague's speeches, but I would ask him to reflect on a wider issue, which is that this House, by a series of actions, has put itself in such a jam on political financing that it seems we have to keep on doing fixes.

First of all, the House passed Bill C-24, which many people lauded and thought was a wonderful thing, the effect of which is that fundraising on a larger basis is pretty well cut off. That has driven leadership candidates and others into raising funds on a micro basis and a whole new dynamic of political fundraising has been created. That dynamic has its difficulties as well.

In our particular case, the difficulties are in the Liberal Party but are about to happen to the Conservative Party, the NDP or the Bloc. They are also going to run into the same difficulties that the Liberal Party had, which is that there is only a limited pool of money. Therefore, candidates effectively are driven to getting loans, either from backers, or if they are no longer backers--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member. I had asked for a short question. He has now lasted more than a minute and there is not even equal time for the hon. member for Windsor--Tecumseh to respond.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I can do this really quickly. It is a simple answer.

It is not a problem for the other three parties. It is a problem for the Liberal Party. We do not have problems finding enough money to run our leadership campaigns. The Conservatives do not and the Bloc does not either. We can get it from individuals. We do not have to go to the big corporate world as the Liberals always have.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-29, which seeks to close loopholes in campaign financing, is a good bill in and of itself, with the exception of the matter that was rejected by the government at report stage, with the support of the NDP, allowing a candidate to incur expenses without necessarily obtaining the party's authorization. The party would then be responsible for those expenses. That seems to be an aberration. However, we still believe that there are enough positive changes in the bill as a whole to support it.

We believe that the legislation should cover loans in order to close loopholes pertaining to financing limits. We would like to remind members that these limits were established as a result of a fight led by the Bloc Québécois in the past requiring that corporate contributions be prohibited and that individual contributions be limited, as has been the case in Quebec for 30 years.

I have been a member of this House for 15 years and I remember an epic debate that took place under the former Liberal government. As Mr. Chrétien's term of office was winding down, the situation was significantly improved by allowing only individuals to make contributions. With this bill, we have gone even further, and that is a very positive aspect of democracy.

Often, when people in other countries have governance difficulties, one of the sources of their problems is actually linked to electoral practices that do not measure up to the requirements of democracy. They deserve better support. So the actions taken today are part of a development we are familiar with, which deserves to be supported.

The Bloc Québécois and Quebec as a whole have really made an interesting contribution in this regard. In Quebec, the Election Act, which was amended during the time of René Lévesque in the 1970s, now serves somewhat as a rule at the federal level, and that is good. It makes for a healthier democracy. It also requires us to seek money from a multitude of people, and thus reduces the excessive impact some contributors have on political parties. In this regard, we are headed in the right direction.

This bill corrects another problem in the Federal Tort Claims Act. During consideration of Bill C-2, the Conservative government was more interested in getting its bill passed in a hurry than in dealing with problems of ethics. In the present context, we realized that some things needed to be added. At that time, the opposition parties, the media and Democracy Watch had raised the problem, and the government refused to act. In the current context, we are correcting some of these situations.

For example, the bill corrects the problem of loans that made it possible to get around the limits on political contributions. In this connection, there are some important points concerning the poor protection of whistleblowers and the lack of reform of the Access to Information Act. However, as far as the problem of loans is concerned, we realized in the past that these loans served as crutches to compensate for the fact that a candidate or a party had not raised enough money. This situation was particularly prevalent in leadership races. We realized that something the new Canada Elections Act did not permit was happening through the back door, that is, raising very large amounts of money from one or two individuals who were providing loans. The aim is to correct this situation.

When this bill was introduced, it was pointed out that during the last leadership race several Liberal candidates took out large loans in order to get around the financing limits in the way I have just described. While it is true that quite a few have acted in this way, it should not be forgotten that the Prime Minister himself did not reveal all his contributions during the leadership race in 2002. So the Conservative Party was not really in a position to lecture anyone. We have also seen it in the past seven years, given the scandals we now know about.

It is necessary to prevent the law from being circumvented by introducing new limits for political contributions. For example, an individual can contribute $1,100 annually to a registered party or to a candidate. The amount a union can contribute annually to a registered party has been reduced to $0. That shows a significant shift in terms of the respect owed to the people who give us our mandates—the voters. It is still possible to circumvent the limits by using personal loans. That will no longer be the case. The example was given of the candidates for the Liberal leadership.

We have corrected many other issues in Bill C-2 that were not adequately addressed in the Federal Accountability Act.

Other ethical problems persist. Even though Bill C-29 corrects the problem of loans that allow candidates to circumvent political contribution limits, there are still many ethical problems that were not fixed by Bill C-2.

For example, many Conservative campaign promises in terms of whistleblower protection did not make it into the Federal Accountability Act. Notably, the Conservatives said that they wanted to “ensure that whistleblowers have access to...legal counsel”. Yet the Conservative bill allows for only $1,500 in legal fees. They also wanted to “give the Public Service Integrity Commissioner the power to enforce compliance with the [whistleblower act]”. Finally, the Conservatives promised to “ensure that all Canadians who report government wrongdoing are protected, not just public servants”.

We understand that Bill C-29, as a whole, will improve the situation. We would have liked it to clarify the situation of candidates who incur expenses for their party, unbeknownst to the party, which would then be liable for them. However, because of the overall improvements it proposes, the Bloc Québécois believes that this bill should be supported.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-29 has some good points to it. There is one however, and I want to ask the member's view on it. It has to do with unpaid loans by a candidate which, if the bill passes, would become the responsibility of the riding association. That may put some riding associations in an awkward situation. I can say that from experience, because the same practice applies provincially where any debts of a candidate become the responsibility of the riding association. In one particular case, in fact in Mississauga South provincially, a candidate who was appointed by the party, not selected by the riding association, had a very substantial and irresponsible level of spending and ran up a $26,000 debt which had to be assumed by those who had absolutely no control over how that spending was done.

In cases such as that, it would seem to me that riding associations would not have very much recourse and may find themselves with a substantial debt of which they had absolutely no control over the spending, nor the resources to repay. I am not sure whether that really hits the target squarely with regard to that provision whereby unpaid loans would automatically be the responsibility of a riding association. I wonder if the member has some comments on that.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague has given other examples to illustrate the situation I raised after the speech by my colleague from the NDP.

Yes, the bill is written in a way that does not correct this situation. Consequently, in a few years, we will be decrying situations such as the ones mentioned by my colleague.

It could happen that four or five people run in ridings where their party is not very popular, incur huge expenses and then their party will be responsible for the debt, even though it did not give permission in the first place.

I do not want to assume that any of the parties here in this House are dishonest, but this situation could happen and it could almost be deliberately planned. There would be no legal recourse to resolve this issue, other than proving that there was collusion to make it happen.

The Bloc Québécois proposed an improvement to the bill. It was supported in committee, but overturned in this House by the Conservatives, with the support of the NDP.

We will see, in the coming months and years, but we will likely end up having to come back and fix the legislation. But it will only be done once we are faced with an actual situation.

As my colleague said, it can apply to a party, but under the new legislation, it could also apply to registered riding associations, which generally have the same rights as a party. This could represent a very serious situation.

If a candidate spends $20,000, out of the entire budget of a Canada-wide party, it will certainly have an effect. However, if the candidate spends the money in a particular riding and the riding association becomes responsible for it, that could be catastrophic.

That is why we would have liked to see this flaw in the bill fixed, so that this does not happen in the future. Despite that, we think the bill deserves the support of the House. We will ensure that this situation is corrected in the future, if our concerns unfortunately become reality.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first I want to congratulate my colleague on his speech.

I heard the answer he just gave to the Liberal member. I do not want to ask him a trick question, but I would like him to elaborate on what he said. We know that the two main pillars of democracy are freedom of speech and transparency. Heaven knows the Conservatives have shown a total lack of transparency regarding several issues that normally should have been submitted to the House in a clear and precise manner. With regard to these two main pillars, can Bill C-29 be compatible with what the member said when we have to ensure that any person who wants to run for office has an equal chance, whether his or her party is strong or weak in the polls? I want to hear what he has to say on how we can reconcile these two concerns.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

We have seen election practices systematically evolve towards this greater transparency over the last 50 years, first through the elimination of contributions to slush funds. Quebec did that 30 years or so ago. Indeed, since the 1970s, under Mr. Lévesque, only individuals, not entities, can make contributions to a political party. It took some time for the Parliament of Canada to pass similar legislation. We have it today but it still needs some polishing because, human nature being what it is, we have to ensure that the legislation does not open the door to improper practices.

As regards the right to speak, any citizen who wants to run in a federal election can do so, either as an independent member, or as a party member, with the pros and the cons related to each option. However, we must see that this can be done while ensuring that each party is given equal opportunities. This is what the whole legislation seeks to achieve. This is why I felt that this bill was missing a part that was necessary, namely to see that, when a candidate is authorized to run for a party, we must ensure, before that candidate spends money, that the party will not be responsible for his expenditures, and that there will not be any unintended commitment for that party.

Unfortunately, that could be part of an election strategy by a party, whereby that party would allow candidates from another party to run in regions where it has few candidates of its own and little chances of winning, and spend a lot of money, thus adversely affecting that party's finances.

All the bills that have been introduced over the past several years seek to improve transparency. We have now discovered a major problem, namely leadership campaigns. After reviewing the Canada Elections Act, we discovered that some strange things had taken place during leadership campaigns, both on the Liberal and the Conservative sides. We want to correct this situation, because we found out that the selection of a political party leader by party members also has an impact on democracy. I believe that making corrections in that regard would, as the hon. member said, improve the chances of voters making a choice that would be as transparent as possible and that would best reflect the democratic will.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise on behalf of the NDP to comment on Bill C-29. It is very appropriate because the NDP, in this corner of the House, has been the foremost advocate of smart and democratic grassroots election financing in Parliaments throughout Canadian history.

I am standing beside the member for Winnipeg Centre who has been a very strong advocate of accountability and has spoken in the House on this bill. It is important to note that the NDP has been walking the talk on democratic grassroots election financing since the very origins of our party back in 1960 and even before that with the CCF.

It is important to note that even in the fifties and sixties, big money essentially dominated Canadian politics because we did not have the kinds of limits around election financing that we find today. How did that happen? It was another minority Parliament from 1972-74. The NDP leader, David Lewis, essentially said that the minority Parliament could only continue if for the first time in Canadian history, election financing limits were put in, both in federal parties and also in constituencies. So that was a key point in Canadian history.

It essentially drew us away from the American model, and I will come back to that in a moment, where there are essentially no limits in election financing, where big money dominates, and brought a unique Canadian contribution to election financing law. That put in place the kinds of limits today that mean that ordinary working people can run for the House of Commons and not expect that they are going to be simply outspent by bankers and big business, that essentially there is an even playing field.

It is important to note that since that first election financing act was put into place, the NDP has had a lot more representation in the House of Commons. Ordinary working families have had a lot more representation. It is not a perfect system yet, and I will come back to that in a moment as well. But essentially, the 1972-74 period was a watershed for Canadian election financing laws.

Why is that important? We see in the United States how democracy plays out, that essentially in most campaigns, particularly at the national level, we see that millionaires get elected because there is no election financing legislation that caps the amount of money that people can spend in election campaigns. We hear about $20 million, $30 million, $40 million campaigns, millionaires stepping forward and basically taking money out of their piggy-bank and then running for public office.

As a result of that, we see that the institutions governed by that lack of respect for the democratic will and a lack of responsibility to assume that there is a level playing field means that legislation does not necessarily get adopted in the interests of ordinary working families.

Here in Canada, through the efforts of Tommy Douglas, we have a public health care system that is financed by public taxes and we have that in place in Canada as a result of the work of the CCF and the NDP. We are very proud of that. In the United States where big money dominates there is still a continued effort to put in place a public health care system; 60 million Americans will not have health coverage at some point in this year 2008 which means they are only a car accident or a fall away from perhaps going bankrupt because they have to pay for their medical costs that could be $100,000 or $200,000.

In Canada, in part because we have a more even playing field, we have been able to bring forward progressive social policy. Of course, the NDP and the CCF have been at the origin of every single progressive piece of legislation brought in for social policy since Confederation.

This brings us to Bill C-29. Essentially, what the NDP has endeavoured to do over the last 30 years is gradually ensure that the level playing field does not have the kinds of loopholes that the parties that tend to represent corporate CEOs tend to like to use. We see it all the time. We put in place legislation and rather than keeping to the principle, the Liberal and Conservative parties are trying to get around those loopholes because they believe big money should dominate politics.

What we are trying to do with Bill C-29, essentially, and what we proposed in the Federal Accountability Act, the wellspring of ideas that has brought about Bill C-29, is close the loophole, that has gradually been put into place over the 30 years since the first adoption of election financing caps, to ensure a party cannot get around the legislation. First there were election financing caps and subsequent to that big corporate donations were shut down.

I remember reading the election returns when I used to work at the NDP national office. At one cocktail party the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party would receive $50,000, $60,000, $100,000 from big banks and big oil companies. Essentially, that has been shut down. It is not in Canadians' interests to have corporate donations dominate the political field. We have had that put into place.

Bill C-29 would close another very important loophole. As soon as Parliament stopped the huge corporate donations that were going to political parties, one would assume political parties would have acted ethically and morally in respect to that legislation, but that did not happen. The Liberal Party found an interesting little loophole.

Under the existing legislation, if a corporate entity loans money to a political candidate or to a political party and that money is not paid back, it becomes a donation. That is an interesting little loophole. Beautiful. We outlaw corporate donations, but a corporate entity can loan money and forget to ask to have it paid back. It then becomes a donation, a direct contravention of the principle of the law that this Parliament put into place.

The NDP saw that loophole right away. We put it forward in the Federal Accountability Act. Ed Broadbent, the former member for Ottawa Centre and Oshawa, was the foremost proponent of that. The member for Winnipeg Centre as well. This loophole allowed largely Liberal members to get around the principle of the act. That brings us to where we are today.

In the most recent Liberal leadership campaign, hundreds of thousands of dollars were loaned to leadership candidates in what was a splurge of money to the Liberal leadership. There did not seem to be any sort of cap. In NDP leadership races, we ensure that there is a cap on leadership donations. People right across the country give small amounts. Some of our leadership candidates have done very well with those small amounts. In the case of the Liberal leadership race, big money came in again with big loans.

Bill C-29 tries to close that important loophole where big companies cannot donate, but they can loan the money and it becomes a donation later.

This is an important principle. What can we say about Quebec’s Election Act? It is one of the best provincial acts. It was not brought into force by a New Democratic government—at least not so far. We certainly hope to have a New Democratic government in Quebec some day.

In any event, Quebec has adopted this principle to ensure that no more than a modest amount can be spent. So you cannot spend $10,000 or $15,000 or $20,000 or $60,000. The limit is set at $3,000, which is more reasonable.

In Canada, as a result of measures adopted by the House a few years ago, a contributor may now give a political party a maximum of $1,100. This is an important factor.

In Quebec, we have in fact seen a change, an improvement, and this has changed the face of politics in Quebec. Since then, the rules of the game have really been more balanced, and there is more discussion of ideas.

The same thing happened in Manitoba. A system was adopted to limit the contributions people can make. There is a New Democratic government in power in Manitoba, and it is governed by that same principle.

This federal principle is therefore modelled on decisions that have already been made by the National Assembly of Quebec, the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, and other governments. It is an important Canadian principle that everyone supports. Playing a shell game to get around that principle is absolutely not in the interests of Canada.

That is the problem. We can play a shell game, because there is a way to get around the law. Since big corporations may not give money, what can they do? They can grant a loan, and later on it will become a donation.

It is hard to believe that a member of this House could object to that principle when he knows full well what progress has been made on this issue since the NDP forced the enactment of the first election spending limits, from 1972 to 1974, when we had a minority government. At that time, former NDP leader David Lewis said he wanted to establish a system that was fair to the families of working people.

Since then, we have seen progress that has allowed us to avoid the kind of activities and involvement we can see in the United States, where money buys seats in Congress and the Senate. Anyone representing working people is the exception. As a rule, representatives are millionaires, particularly in the Senate.

We do not want the same thing to happen in Canada. Certainly the House has millionaires, but there are growing numbers of members from ordinary families. The example we can cite is the fact that the NDP, which had barely a dozen members a few years ago, now has thirty.

We therefore see a net improvement in terms of members who come from more ordinary families, working families, the families that keep Canada moving. It is people from those families who built Canada and who continue to build it. It is important that these people be represented in the House of Commons. Our representatives must not be only bankers and corporate executives, they must also be the people who truly build the Canada they are part of.

What, then, is the position of the NDP on the amendments? We have had a number of good interventions on the issue. The member for Windsor—Tecumseh and the member for Winnipeg Centre have spoken to this issue.

The government has put forward three amendments at report stage. The first one would limit a person to a $1,000 loan per contest. In other words, it would reduce the amount to what is already in keeping with Canadian principles in the Elections Act to per person per contest rather than $1,000 per person per calendar year. We will be supporting that amendment.

The second amendment concerns when the three year payback period begins. We also support that amendment.

The third amendment, which we find difficult to support, is the idea that when the riding association undertakes, or a candidate or a campaign undertakes, a campaign loan, that campaign loan then reverts right back to the political party. It is a question of reasonableness.

Some campaigns can undertake their own loans right across the country. Every political party does. In the next election campaign, only two parties will be running everywhere in the country and in every region, the Prime Minister's Conservative Party and the member for Toronto—Danforth's New Democratic Party.

Everywhere in the country in the next election campaign people will have two choices, two very clear and differing views on the future of the country. I think we are seeing more and more interest in the NDP because people have seen the Prime Minister's vision and they are not quite sure they like it, particularly the corporate welfare provisions where the only thing that seems to be in Conservative budgets is tens of billions of dollars in corporate tax cuts just shovelled off the back of a truck.

The NDP has a vision that is much more in keeping with the values of Canadians, such as improving our health care system, actually dealing with the housing crisis and the homelessness crisis, and reinvesting in Canadian cities. All of those things most Canadian adhere to, but that is a little beyond the scope of the bill.

The point I am making is that in the next election campaign only two parties will be running in all 308 ridings. Other parties will be running in some ridings and not running in other ridings but only two parties will be running in all 308.

Once those candidates have deposited their nomination papers and have received the sign-off from the leader of the political party they are free to undertake loans on behalf of their campaign. They do not need to go to the national office of the political party to get approval for a loan, which is why we are opposed to this particular amendment. The amendment would mean that the political parties would suffer the consequences of a loan that a candidate and its official agent undertakes in the riding, whereas currently they are responsible for that, as they should be. They make the decisions on the ground to what extent they want to undertake a loan on behalf of their particular campaign and they have the responsibility to pay it off.

I have run in two federal campaigns and both of them were balanced budget campaigns. We feel very strongly about that. In fact, in the second campaign we did not need any loan at all because we received a lot of small contributions from people throughout the riding of Burnaby—New Westminster, which was great. However, if individuals must take out a loan, they should be responsible for it. It does not make sense that those individuals, if they run away from that loan, can simply see that loan transferred to the political party head office.

For the next campaign, for the two parties that are running full slates in every region across the country, the NDP and the Conservative Party, it will be extremely important that the local responsibility be maintained. Hopefully, the other parties that are running partial slates will be supportive of the NDP's position on this. However, for the two parties running the national campaign, running everywhere, particularly in their cases, it is important that responsibility stays with the local campaigns.

We have talked a bit about the origins of the election financing act and how things have evolved since then. The NDP has been the chief spokesperson and the principal advocate of putting into place election financing rules that are in keeping with the values that Canadians share from coast to coast to coast.

Canadians believe there needs to be a level playing field in a political contest and that everyone needs to have the same rules apply. They do not believe in loopholes. Therefore, when a Liberal Party member tries to move around the idea that we cannot have corporate financing by getting a loan and converting it into a donation, that is something that must be stopped. That is why we are supportive of this legislation and of most of the amendments.

We believe Canadians support the values of a level playing field, equal participation in politics and accessibility in politics so that an individual, a former manual labourer, can be active in his or her community, can run for political office and can actually be elected because the rules are such that it is a debate of values and ideas rather than simply a contest of who has the biggest wallet.

Speaking as a former manual labourer who is very proud to be in the House of Commons, our election financing act must do just that.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently as the member spoke and one thing that struck me was the apparent hypocrisy of his crying against the way that political parties collect money.

I personally believe that all money contributed to political parties should be from individuals who give of their own free accord.

I guess I should not say this because it is a dreadful thing to say publicly, but I have contributed a lot of money to the NDP, which I am sure the member is happy about, but I did so under coercion. I always had a job where I had compulsory union membership and the unions always supported the NDP with my money. I had no say in it.

I remember one time challenging one of the union bosses on this. I asked him why I had to contribute money to a political party that I was campaigning against. He said that it had been done democratically, that a convention was held and that through a vote it was decided that $100,000 would be given to the provincial NDP and $150,000 to the federal NDP. The union bosses just had a convention among themselves and decided that was how they would spend my money.

I would like the member's reaction to that particular scene.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, for those school children watching today, they just had the definition of the term “red herring”. The hon. member knows very well that under the Elections Act a union cannot donate money in a federal election. There is no opportunity for corporate donations nor union donations.

For those listening, a red herring is something that has absolutely no relevance whatsoever to what is being discussed in the House of Commons. A union cannot donate money, neither at the constituency level nor at the federal party level, and the member knows this. I guess he thought it would be a trick question or that we would not be well-informed but members of this House of Commons know that what he just asked as a question is a red herring because it cannot be done.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's comments. He always has some interesting comments and at times is actually entertaining.

I am sure there is going to be support for this bill, but there are still some points of concern. One of the areas has to do with where a loan is not repaid within the 18 months, et cetera. Some exceptions were noted: one, if the loan is subject to a binding agreement to pay; two, if it is subject to a legal proceeding; third, if it is subject to a dispute as to the amount; or four, if the amount has been written off by the lender as uncollectable. When we have a number of conditions in which a loan may not in fact be handled in the anticipated fashion because it is a bad debt, if we have made a list, then something must be left out. It really should be a blanket provision.

I am wondering whether or not the legislation ought not to have included a proviso that every legal avenue and effort had been taken to recover the loan. Once we start making other parties responsible or not accountable for their legal obligation and their agreement to the terms of the loan, it tends to fuzzy up the legislation.

Someone is going to say that there must have been some connection, or there may have been a quid pro quo that we did not know about. How do we police these kinds of things? How can we ensure that the intent of the law in fact is followed through? We have seen a lot of very strange and creative things happen. The in and out scandal is certainly an interesting one. Although it is not with regard to a candidate directly, it does have to do with candidates who are asked to participate in a matter related to the operations of an election campaign.

The member may have some comments.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Burnaby—New Westminster. There are five minutes left in this question cycle and there are two other members who want to ask questions.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to their questions. I hope they will not be red herrings. I hope they will be legitimate questions.

The member for Mississauga South asked, as he always does, an intelligent question about the impact of that third amendment. The problem the member mentioned is why we are essentially opposing it. Because there would be a transfer to the political head office, to the political headquarters, it does not allow for the candidate's official agent in the riding to essentially take responsibility for the loan and pay it down. That is a problem with the amendment the government is proposing. There is not the legal weight to ensure that at the constituency level that loan is paid off.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my question to the member for Burnaby—New Westminster will come after a comment and a brief reminder.

When he says that the NDP's position with regard to the Canada Elections Act is forward-looking and when he cites Quebec's legislation as an example, he is absolutely right. Quebec's legislation has been in use for 30 years now and it has produced results in terms of cleaning up political contributions.

I want to know if he can lift the fog that rolled in with his remarks.

The NDP member for Windsor—Tecumseh told us earlier that he was not overly concerned about the fact that the party will be liable for a debt incurred by a candidate who is unable to repay that debt, because if a candidate has little chance of being elected, it is very likely that banks will not give him or her a loan. Therefore, he thinks that asking the party to be liable for those debts is not really a problem.

However, in his remarks, this member shared our position, and our concern deals with the fact that a candidate who is unable to pay off a loan can force his or her party to take on that responsibility.

I would ask the member to clarify for us his party's position on this issue.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is very clear. The third amendment would essentially mean that if a loan contracted by a local candidate or an official agent is not paid, it falls to the party headquarters.

We are opposed to this amendment for the reasons just stated. It puts all of the responsibility on the political party even though it may not have approved loans contracted in the ridings.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-29.

I am shocked by my colleague for Burnaby—New Westminster's response to my colleague for Chambly—Borduas in terms of a party's responsibility for loans contracted by candidates. My colleague just said that he was not in favour of this third amendment. I should point out that the amendments to the bill before us are a direct result of the NDP's change in position.

I do not necessarily want to dump on the NDP. We agree on certain things, but not in terms of this bill. There was a prior agreement. Given that I sit on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, I succeeded in getting this amendment in order to withdraw this provision. It has now returned to the bill, which means that the responsibilities and debts contracted by local candidates will become the responsibility of the party in the case of insolvency.

I am on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, a committee which is incidentally inoperative at the moment. A Conservative colleague was elected to replace the chair and member for Cambridge, whom a majority of the members had to kick out. Apparently he was not doing his job properly and impartially. A new chair was elected. Unfortunately this new chair resigned, and this means that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, because of the Conservatives, is inoperative.

On reading the bill, I noted this problem. I agree that a local candidate has a party banner to defend. Still, in the case of the Bloc Québécois, there are 75 ridings. There are more in the case of the so-called “national” parties. The Bloc Québécois is the national party of Quebeckers. We run candidates in the 75 ridings of Quebec. When we talk about 308 ridings and 308 Conservative, Liberal or New Democratic candidates, there is a coordination problem. How do we find out what is happening at the local level? An ill-advised candidate could make excessive, extravagant, totally crazy and inappropriate expenditures. I would even go so far as to say that he might exceed the limit provided for.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

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

Mr. Speaker, somebody keeps yapping and that is distracting me. I realize that you yourself are so distracted that you cannot take down any notes about my speech.

So there could be a breach of the spending limit. The party might not know anything about it but would be responsible for the expenditures of this insolvent person. That is the point of this amendment. I have difficulty seeing the logic of my colleagues from the other parties.

That being said, I consider that we are democrats in the Bloc Québécois, and we will acknowledge the democratic decision of the House. Allow me, however, to express some misgivings that I have.

With regard to the general thrust of Bill C-29, the Bloc Québécois remains in favour of it on the third reading. We consider that it contains some interesting, though perfectible elements, given that by definition perfection does not exist in this lowly world.

We are in favour of it for two main reasons. First of all, we think that it is necessary to provide a framework for loans so as to avoid people getting around the spending limits. We realize this on analyzing certain leadership races, among both the Conservatives and the Liberals.

For example, the member for Toronto Centre, the new Liberal Party critic for foreign affairs, apparently received loans totalling $705,000, including a loan from his brother, John Rae, a former vice-president of Power Corporation, for $580,000 at 5% interest. He apparently lent himself $125,000.

The same goes for the current opposition leader, who is supposed to have received loans totalling $655,000 from various people: Mamdouh Stephanos, Marc de la Bruyere, Stephen Bronfman, Roderick Bryden, Christopher Hoffmann. In all, they amount to $655,000.

Since we are including everyone, the current Prime Minister still refuses to reveal who his contributors were during his run for party leadership in 2002. He refers us the web site of the party once called the Canadian Alliance. That party has changed names many times. First it was the Reform Party, then the Canadian Alliance, and now the Conservative Party. It reminds me of the new Coke: it is the same recipe, but in an improved version. It is actually quite confusing.

In any case, a Globe and Mail article on October 2, 2002, revealed that the current Prime Minister spent $1.1 million on his leadership campaign in 2002. According to the article, the Prime Minister said he had posted a partial list of his contributors on the Canadian Alliance web site, but in fact only those who contributed more than $1,075 were listed. Thus, there are many grey areas.

As for election spending limits regarding contributions from individuals, we know that corporate financing is no longer allowed. We support this. Such limits have always been a traditional demand of the Bloc Québécois, that is, since 1993, for one simple, good reason. The Act to govern the financing of political parties has been in force in Quebec since 1977 and has proven effective. It has helped clean up political and electoral funding practices.

I can still vividly recall former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien paying homage to the legacy of René Lévesque, who gave us Quebec's act respecting elections and referendums in municipalities and the referendum act, among others. I am sure it was not easy for Jean Chrétien to pay homage to René Lévesque.

It is not necessarily logical, and certainly not every day, that Mr. Chrétien would pay tribute to René Lévesque.

That is basically what I wanted to say in my allotted time. Question time is approaching, and I am sure that some of my colleagues have some interesting questions for me. I will be pleased to answer them to the best of my knowledge and abilities. I want to stress that we still support this bill, and that we will likely vote in favour of it.

However, we see some serious problems with the fact that parties are responsible for expenses incurred by candidates at the local level. It should be a given that when someone agrees to run for a particular political party, that individual takes responsibility for his or her own expenses.

It is also important to remember that election campaigns are fast-paced. People who work on an election campaign have a hectic life from morning to night, and that includes the researchers who work nights. It is seven days a week. It is not always possible for all expenses to receive approval from senior party officials. That could mean that, although the party has nothing to do with the expense, it could end up being responsible, which does not make sense and is completely unacceptable.

But regardless, the Bloc Québécois supports this bill overall.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to pursue a point that I raised earlier. It has to do with loans by a financial institution to a candidate. The deemed contributions provisions under 405.7 stipulates that the loan must be repaid by three years. However, if the amount has not been paid, there are four conditions under which it would be a deemed contribution. One of those is the loan has been written off by the lender as an uncollectable debt in accordance with the lender's normal accounting practices.

If that is the case, where there is a deemed contribution, a bank could loan $50,000 to a campaign, write it off and it becomes a deemed contribution. I did not think that was really the intent. I am not sure if I missed something in the legislation, but it would appear there would be a way in which banks could effectively contribute to candidates when corporate and union donations would be prohibited under previous changes to the act.

This concerns me, along with the issue that the loans or debts incurred by a candidate would ultimately turn out to be the responsibility of a riding association or a political party if they were unpaid. The member may have—

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord.

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

Mr. Speaker, my colleague has raised some serious issues. However, we remain convinced that the problem lies with the wording. It is all about the interpretation. Given that we are about to pass this bill, we believe that it would have been advantageous to improve the final wording of the bill in order to clear up any misunderstandings or errors of interpretation.

That is precisely why we have courts, to interpret the laws passed by parliaments. While travelling by plane, I had the opportunity to speak with a superior court judge, who told me that if parliamentarians would pass good, clear laws, there would be no need for the courts to interpret them. We recognize the independence of the judiciary and the executive. The judiciary only interprets the laws that are drafted by this Parliament.

It would have been better to have obtained further clarifications. However, I greatly appreciate my colleague's comments.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nordon his speech.

He spoke about transparency in the financing of political parties and touched on the transparency in financing for the leadership races of major parties, giving as an example his observations about a party that opened its books, and we need only think of the leader of the official opposition.

What we have been able to obtain is quite revealing and that is appropriate because this information should be available to citizens.

He also gave the example of the leader of the government, that is the Prime Minister, who did not open his books and, once again, muddied the waters as much as possible so that citizens know nothing.

I would like to ask my colleague this question: in the near future, should we not put measures in place—especially when dealing with a party leader or a leadership race—to ensure that transparency and information be required?

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

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is absolutely right. It is the principle that I have adapted to fit this situation: tell me who your backers are and I will tell you who you are. Human nature being what it is, it can be easy to reward or help those who helped us. It is called returning the favour.

If everything was done in the full light of day for everyone to see—in an open and transparent manner—it would not leave any questions unanswered.

The same thing could be said for the Couillard affair. Perhaps, Mr. Speaker, you will invoke the relevance rule to interrupt me, but you will be interrupting me in the next few seconds anyway. By not allowing the ministers and the Prime Minister to appear before the committee, the government is sowing the seeds of doubt.

Last weekend, I took part in eight events. People are asking us what the Conservatives have to hide and why they do not want to tell the truth.

It could be the same for leadership races.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

There are four minutes left for questions and comments on the member's speech, but we must proceed now to statements by members.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Before question period, the hon. member for Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord had the floor for questions and comments following his speech.

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Yukon.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot remember if the member referred to it in his speech, but I would ask him to repeat the rationale for how to deal with the problem of a person running for office who incurs debts that people do not know about, with those debts then becoming the responsibility of the local or national party. If a new candidate for the Bloc Québécois were to incur a lot of debt that the party does not know about and the party has to pay for it, is there any precedent for that elsewhere in life?

My other question is related to the financing and to allowing only chartered financial institutions to provide the financing. Does that then give them a more favoured position in that they are the only ones that can provide the loan financing?

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

Mr. Speaker, it is a shame that there are only three or four minutes left in the debate. I almost wish I could seek unanimous consent to talk about this for another 20 minutes, but I will be reasonable.

I will explain to my colleague that the problem stems from the fact that a local candidate could incur expenses to get nominated or elected, expenses that the party could be completely unaware of, expenses that could be considerable. The individual could declare bankruptcy, and the party would be liable for the debt.

My colleague is a member of the Liberal Party. There will be 308 candidates in the next election. Some of them might end up spending excessive sums of money to get their nominations.

Why should the party be responsible for expenses that it did not even know about? That is the problem.

I see that my colleague, the member for Hull—Aylmer, is here. I managed to get an amendment in the committee to raise this absurd possibility. Unfortunately, we have to go back to the original starting point as it was set out in Bill C-29 at first reading.

[Marcel Proulx, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague to explain once again, however briefly in the time that remains, the negative impact of this. I realize that his answer will have to be brief, but so is my question.

As members of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, we worked on this issue together, and I think that my colleague should have a chance to explain this once again, however briefly, because it is of utmost importance that everyone understand his point of view on this.

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

Mr. Speaker, in law, this is what we call the principle of surety. A guarantor is responsible for the debts incurred by a third party. We wonder why, if the guarantor did not witness the expenses—in this case, the political party did not witness the ineligible expenses—it should be held responsible for expenses made unbeknownst to it by a third party.

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take this opportunity to present my general views on this bill, and on what accountability with respect to loans means.

Of course, I cannot imagine that many people here would be opposed to tighter controls. Personally, I am very much in support of a strict control of election expenses, and of ensuring that there is no way to circumvent the Canada Elections Act, so as to manage—illegally—to spend more money during an election campaign.

As we know—and the numbers are often mentioned by many in our society, with good reason—elections cost a fortune. To whom? Because of our type of financing—and we should be pleased that it is primarily a public type of funding—elections cost money to taxpayers. They are the ones who must once again foot the bill. Indeed, a large number of candidates will be refunded for their election expenses. Of course, this costs a lot of money to militants, to people with or without party memberships, who decide to make an election contribution. It is important to keep this in mind, when we look at the spirit and the letter of legislation dealing directly or indirectly with the issue of financing.

Since 2004, when I ran in my first non-municipal election, a federal one, I thought—and I still do—that the goal was to limit money spent during an election or leadership campaign. I always thought that the last thing a candidate should do is blithely say that they need a certain amount of money or else they will not be able to get elected. There could be some stiff consequences for the people paying the bill at the end of the day.

In recent years, I have observed different parties and realized that the opposite is true: parties are departing from the spirit of the law to find ways to spend as much money as possible, and in some cases, more money than the law allows. That in itself is rather telling. At the federal level, the law was changed a few years ago to give parties access to rather significant funding: $1.75 per vote in the different ridings. This corresponds to direct funding for the parties by the government, thus by taxpayers, the public, the people paying taxes in various forms.

One way to spend more than what is authorized is obviously to take out loans for which the terms of repayment are unfair. These loans make it possible for individuals or businesses to make significant contributions to get a candidate or party elected, while ignoring the set limits.

In my opinion, election spending should be as closely monitored as possible, and any deviations should be punished as severely as possible. That is the objective of this bill, and for that it is laudable, although there are still some restrictions, such as the ones other colleagues have mentioned. I will not go into detail about what was discussed before my speech.

Nevertheless, there is an inequity that I would like to see changed one day. For our democratic process, referred to as an “election”, there are essentially two types of candidates: party candidates and independent candidates.

Of course I take full responsibility for the decision I made a little over a year ago. When I run again, as I have announced, it will be up to me to take charge of my election campaign according to the guidelines I will set for myself.

People should take the time to read the Canada Elections Act and talk to independent candidates, past or future. It is remarkable to see that because they do not run under a party banner, they are not treated the same under the Canada Elections Act as are candidates who run as part of a party. Whether or not a party is aiming to be in power is irrelevant.

As soon as it comes to a recognized party with associations, there are known financing methods. I will name a simple way to generate revenue known to the majority of people here in this House, as well as to those watching at home. I am talking about fundraising activities—collecting, one way or another, reasonable contributions of $20 or $50 that the people in our municipalities and towns are willing to give to a candidate or a party.

If independent candidates try to obtain funding, they must naturally give a receipt to record the transaction and keep detailed financial records. Yet, they cannot give tax receipts. They can only do that once the event has started, that is to say, once an election has been called. That seems truly absurd to me.

The member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel had this to say on Friday:

—it is disappointing that not everyone in this House realizes that politics should be open to every man and woman, to every citizen. It is not a matter of money, friends or anything like that. It takes someone [referring to candidates] who is able to express their ideas and defend them—

This clearly demonstrates that an inequity exists from the outset, since the elections act imposes such a limit and makes such an important distinction between independent candidates and candidates running for a particular party. In any case, I would like to tell future independent candidates to be prepared, because once they are elected to this House, the inequity will continue. Indeed, our parliamentary system is a party-based system, so one must have patience. We are given the opportunity to speak during a debate, as I am speaking now, but only after all other members have spoken and right before the debate ends. We can attend committee meetings and sit at the table, but we do not have the right to speak, unless another member shares a moment or two of his or her time with us. I would point out that this is highly unlikely, since time is always at a premium in committees.

So, once again, when it comes to elections, there is discrimination. The Canada Elections Act truly reserves different treatment for candidates who want to serve their constituents but not under a particular party.

As for loans, it would be very difficult for independent candidates to take out loans in good conscience, knowing full well that they will not be able to pay them back. Indeed, only small amounts of money could be borrowed, considering the short amount of time these people have for their funding, that is, probably 25, 27 or 30 days, at the most.

Anyone who has been through an election campaign knows what is involved in funding a campaign, not to mention running the campaign itself. Since there is a non-repayment provision, it would be entirely dishonest to take out a loan when the candidate knows full well that he or she will not be able to pay it back when the time comes, with no riding association involved that make up the shortfall by holding special events. Clearly, this is impossible for independent candidates.

I thought this was an important point to raise for those watching us. Indeed, very few people know this.

Like my other colleagues in the House, I regularly meet with people in my riding and we talk about this aspect of election campaigns. It should be said that many hundreds of people run in federal elections as independents. It is not unusual. It is unfair to them right off the top, therefore, because they will not have the same opportunity to raise money as people who run on behalf of a party.

We know very well, of course, that candidates can fund their own campaign. We are entitled, as individuals, to give to our own campaigns. I have always done so, and the amount can be topped up with an equal amount given as a candidate. Unless the figures have changed, it is about $2,200. That is already a good start for someone who wants to run as an independent. It will hardly surprise anyone to hear it, but I think these rules should be changed, along with some others.

My colleague from Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup said earlier that independents and party members run with all the pros and the cons that their status entails. He also said that candidates should be given equal opportunities. I agree with him on that. They should have equal opportunities, and this means the overall situation should be fair. That is not the case, though, as I just explained.

It is necessary, therefore, for the most basic funding avenues to be available to any citizen who wants to get involved in politics. I think we need fewer and fewer irritants because there is unfortunately a lot of cynicism at large in the general public. I say unfortunately because I think it is bad for democracy. I can understand it very well, though, because we regularly see moments in the House that are not exactly brimming over with respect and goodwill. Quite the contrary, there are times when the least pleasant aspects of human nature take over, on both sides of the aisle. We often see it at the end of a session when it is time for us to leave and go meet with our voters and take a few days of well deserved rest.

In summary, independent thinkers who do not want to have their say through a particular political party have a somewhat more limited ability to speak and act when the key moment arrives in democratic life, that is to say, elections. In other ways, though, many people clearly see an advantage in being independent, and I am one of them.

I chose to be an independent MP and believe me when I say that I accept full responsibility for that. I just wanted to point out the differences. I am not complaining. I just wanted to mention some of the inequities that exists. And I believe that this inequity, if not injustice, must be corrected because we have a democratic system. We are proud of our democratic system. Furthermore, we are envied throughout the world.

When we have to take measures to restore balance, we do so here on behalf of the people we represent. And I believe that such measures are indicated.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have watched the hon. member, in her role as an independent member of Parliament, show up all the time. She is here, she does her work and she needs to be recognized for her contribution, in spite of the challenges she has mentioned.

We talked earlier about how Prime Minister Chrétien brought in the toughest legislation and made a lot of changes to how we would run our elections, as well as other things, when it came to ensuring fairness and transparency. However, the issue of the spending limit interests me, given some of the changes, and a lot of us desire full accountability and transparency.

Does the member think we should, along with Elections Canada, also look at the whole issue of the limits we would be allowed to spend on elections, that if we had lower limits, less fundraising would be needed, which is always a challenge for everyone?

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her glowing comments. It is always nice to recognize each other's work. Most of us do very good work, with conviction and sometimes with emotion. I understand my colleague to have said that we owe this legislation to Mr. Chrétien. I am pleased to say, as other colleagues have said in this House, that he followed Mr. Lévesque's lead. People know that not only am I an independent, but I am also a separatist. I am always pleased to commend Mr. Lévesque, his influence and his inspiration.

As far as limits are concerned, as I was saying earlier, I think our goal should be to spend as little as possible and not to adopt the philosophy of spending as much as possible, since it is not our money. It is not right to think that way because it is all our constituents who pay a big part of the bill, whether through the Elections Canada rebates, and that is fine, or through financial donations.

In my opinion, it has always been absurd for political parties to tell their candidates to take advantage and spend the maximum in order to elect their party and their candidates. The priority should obviously be to work as democratically as possible, to defend the common good and our citizen's interests and to show them how we, as candidates, plan on doing that.

What about visual pollution? We should agree to not buy the huge numbers of signs that we see in major centres or rural regions on posts kilometres apart. Candidates in rural areas know this. In the cities, it is a visual abomination and is very harmful to the environment because the material used, coroplast, is not recyclable. It can be used to insulate garages, but it lasts 504 years.

Our guiding principles could be to spend less and also to save the environment. I have never believed, especially in the case of candidates outside major urban centres, that regional advertising in daily newspapers has helped elect anyone. We do it because everyone else is doing it. Candidates end up spending inordinate amounts.

To answer my colleague's question, I have always been pleased to say, and this can be verified, that I have always spent only half of the amount allowed by the Chief Electoral Officer in my riding.

[Daniel Petit, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened closely to my colleague. I would like to begin by congratulating her on her work. We have attended committee meetings on the issue of violence against seniors together, and I appreciated her presence there because she knows this file well. I have also benefited from her advice when we discussed this issue together.

Today, we are considering a particular act, the act that governs the election of members of Parliament. Earlier, my colleague said that she wants to spend as little as possible. My question is, does she agree with a political party that demands that its candidates spend the maximum allowed so that it can get as much as possible back from Elections Canada? Does she agree with that?

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the answer to that is easy. I know exactly what the member is getting at: he is looking for an answer he can use.

I have always expressed my opinion publicly, whether to party officials or in my riding. I am against any kind of action that makes it appear as though people are taking advantage of money that, as I said, comes from public coffers, from taxpayers.

That is disgraceful in and of itself, regardless of the party involved. There could be as many as 150 registered parties in Canada. I have no idea. Provincially, in Quebec anyway, it is the same thing. It would be appalling to ask a party to spend as much as possible in such-and-such a riding when reimbursement is guaranteed because it will garner at least 10% of the vote.

To answer my colleague, it is unbelievable that any candidate representing a party in this House—Conservative, Liberal, New Democrat, Bloc or independent—would be unable to figure this out for him or herself, would fail to think this over and decide that it is not right, to realize that the money is not a gift from the gods, that taking money from fellow citizens and the general public simply should not be done.

Actually, there is a way to work it out without using the maximum allowed.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, you are an honourable man and I am just amazed that you would not let the member speak in committee because she is an independent. Does the member have some suggestions that she should at least have one out of three hundred and eighth of the amount time to be allowed to speak in committee?

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question. As I said earlier, and I have discussed this with several people, but many members in this House are not aware of the fact that members sitting as independents are not allowed to speak at committee, unless another member agrees to share his or her time with them. All they are allowed to do is sit at the table.

I suggest that the rules be changed. The parties should be able to reach an agreement. Similarly, when we rise to seek the unanimous consent of the House, we should not state that there is agreement among the parties. Everyone in this House should forget about the political parties and think instead of the other meaning of parties, or sides.

I can say that the four independent members of Parliament are merrily ignored by all parties. It is as if they did not exist, as if their consent was not required. So, from time to time, I make a point of rising to refuse consent, at which time I indicate that I was duly elected to this House, even though I left a party to sit as an independent member, as opposed to another member who was elected as an independent. I work as hard as my colleagues.

Every independent member should have speaking time both in the House and at committees. That is essential. We have things to do and things to say, and what we do is just as valuable as what our colleagues do. We bring grist to the mill. We are here to debate. A fine way to recognize that would be to give unanimous consent to allow independent members to speak at least three or four minutes every two hours of sitting time of a committee. That is not too much.

I expect my colleague from Yukon to make that suggestion to his party.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung:

The vote is postponed until tomorrow at 5:30 p.m.

The House resumed from June 16 consideration of the motion that Bill C-29, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act (accountability with respect to loans), be read the third time and passed.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at the third reading stage of Bill C-29.

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung

(The House divided on the motion which was agreed to on the following division:)

Vote #157

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

I declare the motion carried.

(Bill read the third time and passed)

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, if you seek it, I think you would find unanimous consent for the following motions: one, “That, in relation to its study on the seal harvest, seven members of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans be authorized to travel to Brussels, Belgium in September/October 2008 and that the necessary staff accompany the Committee”; two, “That, for the remainder of this session, during its consideration of matters pursuant to Standing Order 83.1, the Standing Committee on Finance be authorized to adjourn from place to place within Canada and to permit the broadcasting of its proceedings thereon, and that the necessary staff accompany the Committee”; three, “That, in relation to its study of science and technology in Canada, twelve (12) members of the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology be authorized to travel to Waterloo, Ontario; Toronto, Ontario; Montreal, Quebec; Sydney, Nova Scotia; Boston, Massachusetts and Washington, D.C. in September 2008 and that the necessary staff accompany the Committee”; and four, “That, at any time the House stands adjourned during June 2008, the Standing Committee on Official Languages has ready a report, when that report is deposited with the Clerk, it shall be deemed to have been duly presented to the House”.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Is there unanimous consent?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[An hon. member]

No.

[Bill Casey, Independent, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

Mr. Speaker, on the last three motions I would give my consent, but on the first one I would not.

The fisheries committee went to all of the fishing provinces in Canada except Nova Scotia. They refused to come and hold public hearings in Nova Scotia. If they will not do that, they should not be allowed to go to Brussels in Belgium.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would ask then that the other motions I read into the record be deemed adopted by the House unanimously.

[The Acting Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Does the hon. government whip have unanimous consent of the House?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.