Bill C-23 (Historical)

Fair Elections Act

An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and other Acts and to make consequential amendments to certain Acts

This enactment amends the Canada Elections Act (“the Act”) to require the Chief Electoral Officer to issue interpretation notes and guidelines on the application of that Act to registered parties, registered associations, nomination contestants, candidates and leadership contestants. It also requires the Chief Electoral Officer, on request, to issue a written opinion on the application of provisions of the Act to an activity or practice that a registered party, registered association, nomination contestant, candidate or leadership contestant proposes to engage in.
The enactment also modifies the Chief Electoral Officer’s power under section 17 of the Act so that the power may only be exercised to allow electors to exercise their right to vote or to allow votes to be counted. It also limits the Chief Electoral Officer’s power to transmit advertising messages to electors and requires the Chief Electoral Officer to ensure that any information so transmitted is accessible to electors with disabilities.
The enactment further amends the Act to permit the Chief Electoral Officer to seek approval from parliamentary committees to test an alternative voting process (but where such a pilot project is to test a form of electronic voting, the Chief Electoral Officer must first obtain the approval of the Senate and House of Commons). The enactment also eliminates the mandatory retirement of the Chief Electoral Officer at age 65 and replaces it with a 10-year non-renewable term. It provides for the establishment of an Advisory Committee of Political Parties to provide advice to the Chief Electoral Officer on matters relating to elections and political financing. The enactment also amends the Act to provide for the appointment of field liaison officers, based on merit, to provide support to returning officers and provide a link between returning officers and the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer. It also enables the Chief Electoral Officer to temporarily suspend a returning officer during an election period and provides for the appointment of additional election officers at polling stations. Finally, it empowers registered parties and registered associations, in addition to candidates, to provide names of individuals for election officer positions and changes the deadline for providing those names from the 17th day before polling day to the 24th day before polling day.
The enactment also adds to the Act Part 16.1, which deals with voter contact calling services. Among other things, that Part requires that calling service providers and other interested parties file registration notices with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, provide identifying information to the Commission and keep copies of scripts and recordings used to make calls. That Part also requires that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission establish and maintain a registry, to be known as the Voter Contact Registry, in which the documents it receives in relation to voter contact calling services are to be kept.
The enactment also replaces Part 18 of the Act with a new, comprehensive set of rules on political financing that corrects a number of deficiencies in the Act. Notably, the enactment
(a) increases the annual contribution limits for contributions to registered parties, registered associations, candidates and nomination and leadership contestants to $1,500 per year and by $25 per year after the first year;
(b) increases the amount that candidates and leadership contestants may contribute to their own campaigns to $5,000 and $25,000, respectively;
(c) permits registered parties and registered associations to make transfers to candidates before their nomination is confirmed by the returning officer;
(d) requires a registered party’s auditor to complete a compliance audit in relation to its election expenses return indicating that the party has complied with the political financing rules;
(e) requires registered parties, registered associations and candidates to disclose details of expenses for voter contact calling services in their returns;
(f) reforms the rules governing unpaid claims, making it an offence for claims to remain unpaid after three years and strengthening the reporting of unpaid claims;
(g) reforms the reporting requirements of leadership contestants;
(h) permits higher spending limits for registered parties and candidates if an election period is longer than the 37-day minimum;
(i) includes new rules on political loans; and
(j) defines “capital asset” for the purposes of reporting the distribution cost of advertising or promotional material transmitted to the public using a capital asset, so that the expense is reported as the corresponding rental value for the period in which it was used, and for the purpose of the disposal of the campaign surplus.
With respect to voter identification, the enactment amends the Act to require the same voter identification for voting at the office of the returning officer in an elector’s own riding as it requires for voting at ordinary polls. It also prohibits the use of the voter information card as proof of identity, eliminates the ability of an elector to prove their identity through vouching, allows an elector to swear a written oath of their residence provided that their residence is attested to on oath by another elector, and requires an elector whose name was crossed off the electors’ list in error to take a written oath before receiving a ballot.
The enactment also amends the Act to provide an extra day of advance polling on the eighth day before polling day, creating a block of four consecutive advance polling days between the tenth and seventh days before polling day. It requires a separate ballot box for each day of advance polling and details procedures for the opening and closing of ballot boxes during an advance poll. Finally, it gives returning officers the authority to recover ballot boxes on the Chief Electoral Officer’s direction if the integrity of the vote is at risk.
The enactment also amends the Act to, among other things, establish a process to communicate polling station locations to electors, candidates and political parties, to provide that only an elector’s year of birth is to be displayed on the lists of electors used at the polls, instead of the full date of birth, to permit candidates’ representatives to move to any polling station in the electoral district after being sworn in at any polling station in the district and to establish a procedure for judicial recounts.
The enactment further amends the Act to change how the Commissioner of Canada Elections is appointed. It establishes that the Commissioner is to be appointed by the Director of Public Prosecutions for a seven-year term, subject to removal for cause, that the Commissioner is to be housed within the Director’s office but is to conduct investigations independently from the Director, and that the Commissioner is to be a deputy head for the purposes of hiring staff for his or her office and for managing human resources.
The enactment also amends the Act to add the offence of impersonating or causing another person to impersonate a candidate, a candidate’s representative, a representative of a registered party or registered association, the Chief Electoral Officer, a member of the Chief Electoral Officer’s staff, an election officer or a person authorized to act on the Chief Electoral Officer’s or an election officer’s behalf. It also adds the offences of providing false information in the course of an investigation and obstructing a person conducting an investigation. In addition, it creates offences in relation to registration on the lists of electors, registration on polling day, registration at an advance polling station and obligations to keep scripts and recordings used in the provision of voter contact calling services.
The enactment further amends the Act to provide for increases in the amount of penalties. For the more serious offences, it raises the maximum fine from $2,000 to $20,000 on summary conviction and from $5,000 to $50,000 on conviction on indictment. For most strict liability offences, it raises the maximum fine from $1,000 to $2,000. For registered parties, it raises the maximum fine from $25,000 to $50,000 on summary conviction for strict liability political financing offences and from $25,000 to $100,000 on summary conviction for political financing offences that are committed intentionally. For third parties that are groups or corporations that fail to register as third parties, it raises the maximum fine to $50,000 for strict liability offences and to $100,000 for offences that are committed intentionally and for offences applying primarily to broadcasters, it raises the maximum fine from $25,000 to $50,000.
The enactment amends the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act to authorize the Chief Electoral Officer to provide administrative support to electoral boundary commissions. It amends the Telecommunications Act to create new offences relating to voter contact calling services and to allow the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to use the inspection and investigation regime in that Act to administer and enforce part of the voter contact calling services regime in the Canada Elections Act. It amends the Conflict of Interest Act to have that Act apply to the Chief Electoral Officer. It also amends the Director of Public Prosecutions Act to provide that the Director of Public Prosecutions reports on the activities of the Commissioner of Canada Elections.
Finally, the enactment includes transitional provisions that, among other things, provide for the transfer of staff and appropriations from the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions to support the Commissioner of Canada Elections.

Fair Elections Act

[Murray Rankin, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the question, and his reference to section 11 of the Competition Act is very apt.

There has been a number of comments after the case of Hunter et al. v. Southam Inc., which dealt with the issues of the constitutionality of the search and seizure provisions of the Competition Act, by noted experts like Neil Finkelstein, who has written about this, citing Mr. Justice Gonthier's aggressive—I can only use that word—reference, in the Chrysler and Competition Tribunal case, to the fact that they have these kinds of powers.

I have to simply repeat: Why would we need to change it now? What is the problem?

The most effective measure that is required in enhancing investigation is giving people the power to compel testimony to the commissioner's investigators. Those constitutional safeguards that I mentioned, that are now in the Competition Act, have been found constitutional. They work. They are aggressive. They get the job done. Why do we need to change?

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in my place today to speak to Bill C-23, the fair elections act.

This legislation would ensure everyday citizens are in charge of democracy by putting special interests on the sidelines and rule breakers out of business. It would also make it harder to break election laws. The bill would close loopholes to big money, impose new penalties on political imposters who make rogue calls, and empower law enforcement.

The fair elections act would protect voters from rogue calls with a mandatory public registry for mass calling, prison time for impersonating election officials, and increased penalties.

The bill would give more independence to the Commissioner of Canada Elections, allowing him or her control over staff and investigations, empowering him or her to seek tougher penalties for existing electoral offences, and providing more than a dozen new offences to combat big money, rogue calls, and fraudulent voting.

This legislation would crack down on voter fraud by prohibiting vouching or voter information cards as acceptable forms of ID; make the rules for elections clearer, predictable and easier to follow; ban the use of loans used to evade donation rules; repeal the ban on premature transmission of election results; and uphold free speech.

Bill C-23 would provide better customer service to voters and establish an extra day of polling.

Finally, in the case of disagreements over election expenses, an MP would be allowed to present the disputed case in the courts and to have judges quickly rule on it before the CEO seeks the MP's suspension.

What I really want to focus on today is something that I know my colleagues in the House are also concerned about, the way in which Canada's election rules would be enforced.

I would like to run through how the bill would increase the powers and the independence of the Commissioner of Canada Elections and how it would give the commissioner sharper teeth, a longer reach, and a freer hand.

I would remind the House that it is the duty of the commissioner to ensure that the provisions of the Canada Elections Act and the Referendum Act are complied with and enforced.

Let me move quickly to the ways in which the bill would provide the commissioner with sharper teeth to uphold Canada's election laws.

Sharper teeth means tougher penalties for existing offences. Take the penalties for impersonation, providing false information, or obstructing an investigation. These would be new offences with significant penalties: a maximum fine of $20,000 or imprisonment for up to one year on summary conviction, or a maximum fine of $50,000 and imprisonment for up to five years on indictment.

Candidates and official agents convicted of this offence would be prohibited from being a member of the House of Commons or holding any office in the nomination of the Crown or of the Governor in Council for seven years.

The maximum fines would also be increased for serious election offences, such as taking a false oath or making a false or erroneous declaration to election officials. For summary conviction, the fines would be increased from $2,000 to $20,000, and for indictment, they would be increased from $5,000 to $50,000.

In a similar manner, the maximum fines would be increased for a wide range of offences, including failure to appoint an agent or auditor, failure to register as a third party, failure to provide quarterly returns and financial transaction returns, and transmitting advertising during a broadcasting blackout.

The bill before us would also eliminate the limitation period for offences requiring intent. The commissioner would be able to go back further in time to catch deliberate law-breaking.

All members would agree that the provisions of the bill would give the commissioner sharper teeth with which to enforce the current provisions of the Canada Elections Act.

Just as important is the longer reach the bill would give the commissioner. Longer reach means empowering the commissioner with more than a dozen new offences to combat big money, rogue calls, and fraudulent voting.

At the outset, this legislation would make it illegal to impersonate political agents or election officials. This was a recommendation of the preventing deceptive communications report issued by the Chief Electoral Officer.

It would also make it an offence to make false or misleading statements relating to qualifications as an elector or registering as an elector when not qualified. New offences for breaches of the political financing rules have been created as well, including knowingly making indirect loans to a campaign.

As members are aware, this bill would also give the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, the CRTC, the responsibility to administer the new voter contact registry. Under the longer reach provisions of this bill, there would be new penalties relating to non-compliance with the voter contact registry, as well as offences for failing to keep scripts and recordings used in the provision of voter contact calling services. Once again, I think it is clear that in addition to providing the Commissioner of Elections with sharper teeth, Bill C-23 would give him a longer reach.

Finally, let me outline how the bill gives the commissioner a freer hand.

A freer hand means the commissioner would have full independence, with control of his or her staff and investigations, and a fixed term of seven years so that he or she could not be fired without cause.

Under the current system, the commissioner reports directly to the Chief Electoral Officer and relies upon the support and resources of the CEO. The Chief Electoral Officer and the Commissioner of Elections have fundamentally different roles and responsibilities. The former administers an election; the latter enforces the rules. Both are vitally important functions in a democracy, but it makes no sense to have one of these officers report to the other. In fact, it is inappropriate to do so.

That is why, consistent with separating the administration of an election from the enforcement of election law, the fair elections act would house the commissioner within the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. To ensure the independence of the commissioner, the commissioner's powers and functions would remain the same, but he would make his own staffing decisions and direct his investigations independently of the Director of Public Prosecutions and Elections Canada. As well, all future appointees would hold the position for a non-renewable seven-year fixed term.

While the investigation and prosecution functions would be administratively housed in the same office, the Director of Public Prosecutions would have no role in the commissioner's investigations. To maintain the integrity of the position, those individuals who have previously been a candidate, an employee of a registered party, exempt staff of a minister, or staff of a member of Parliament, or an employee of Elections Canada would not be eligible to be appointed commissioner.

To ensure continuity, the fair elections act proposes that the current Commissioner of Canada Elections remain in his role. This will allow for all current investigations to continue uninterrupted.

Bill C-23 would remove the provision that provides that the Chief Electoral Officer can direct the commissioner to carry out investigations. However, the Chief Electoral Officer would be able to ask the commissioner to investigate an allegation. As well, any Canadian would be able to ask the commissioner to look into irregularities.

Finally, the commissioner would have the ability to initiate his own investigations. The fair elections act would provide the commissioner with all the tools he would need to initiate investigations against all those bound by the Canada Elections Act, including Elections Canada officials, and investigate any matter if he believed there had been a possible violation of the law.

The bill before us would give the Commissioner of Canada Elections a freer hand in enforcing Canada's election laws. The bill before us would both fine-tune existing rules and provide new laws to govern practices that have come to the fore in recent elections.

It also sets out new rules that would provide for the effective enforcement of those rules by giving the Commissioner of Elections sharper teeth, a longer reach, and a freer hand to uphold the integrity of our election system. I hope all hon. members will join me in supporting this bill.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's comments. However, when we look at the bill, it is evident that it would discourage people from voting; it is not in place to encourage people to vote.

I wonder if my colleague would comment as to why the Conservatives drafted a piece of legislation without actually speaking to the people who know most about the Canada Elections Act. I think Mr. Mayrand himself indicated that he was not consulted to get his input about the changes that would occur. Will they now talk to him, prior to forcing the legislation through? Will they also ensure that there is public consultation on this bill? The public certainly want to have a say

Will they reinstate the voucher system? It is a system that actually worked. I can tell members that I have had to vouch for people in the past because they did not have proper identification at the time.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Mr. Speaker, before I answer the number of questions that the hon. member asked, I would like to thank the Minister of State for Democratic Reform. I think he has done a tremendous job by introducing a bill of this magnitude. I know him to be someone who would systematically work through the current elections act to see where there are gaps. I truly believe, as he has mentioned, that he did meet with the current CEO of Elections Canada. He also referenced a number of surveys he had reviewed, as well as taking in the concerns of many Canadians and parliamentarians.

In terms of the vouching, and I think that was the last question the member asked, I want to draw the member's attention to the Neufeld report, commissioned by Elections Canada. This report indicated that there were administrative deficiencies at the polls in the 2011 election, that vouching procedures were complex, and that there were irregularities in 25% of cases where vouching was used.

I see that my time is up. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, on the vouching issue, I am assuming that some component of the member's riding is rural. She is nodding, so I guess that is the case.

I have a very rural riding. There are a lot of people, including seniors, first nations, and students, who travel to other parts of the country and who rely on the vouching system.

I understand where she and the minister are coming from about the abuse in the system. I am not naive to the fact that abuse exists within the vouching system. However, we do not throw this entire system out because of that. There are ways around this. We could converse with the officials of Elections Canada to ensure that some system of vouching exists for all of the disenfranchised people in her riding.

Does she not think this is a bit too drastic a way to fix a system? Is this not a big hammer to squash a bug?

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely correct; a fairly large portion of my riding is rural.

The process we are in today will see us debate the bill at second reading, and then the bill will be passed on to the committee to take a look at and to hear from witnesses. It is my hope that he will raise this very question at committee, to see what could be done to address some of the barriers that exist for people in rural Canada when it comes to the identification that is needed.

However, we do know that there are still 39 other pieces of identification that a voter would be able to present when they get to the polls to ensure they would be able to cast their vote on election day.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a great pleasure to be able to speak to Bill C-23 today. I want to pause and say that when we have these rushed processes with closure on debate and an abbreviated time to look at a critical bill, it is rare for me to have a speaking opportunity. Therefore, I want to thank the Liberal Party for giving me a speaking slot today. I do not know if I agree with them in every aspect of their objections to this bill, but I agree with many of them.

When I look at what we need in Canada to fix democracy, I remember a clever little ad put together by Fair Vote Canada. Don Ferguson of Royal Canadian Air Farce, one of my favourite icons of Canadian comedy, starred in it. He wore a white lab coat and started talking about the serious tragedy of electoral dysfunction in Canada, the failure to perform well when it came to elections.

I will not go down the double entendres that went through that Fair Vote Canada ad, but as members can imagine there were many of them. However, it did bring to mind the need for a prescription to fix an unhealthy system. The ad pointed to the issue of getting rid of first past the post. It is fundamental to fair elections in Canada that election results are then mirrored in the composition of our House of Commons.

We need reform. We need a fair elections act. We need to deal with the unhealthy level of hyper-partisanship, the non-stop attack ads, and the fact that we have not gotten to the bottom of the robocall scandal of the last election. However, this bill is not it.

A real prescription for a healthy democracy is in our grasp and instead we get this bill that would weaken our electoral system, weaken democracy, and further reduce voter turnout. We had an opportunity to sideline the cynical politics of non-stop attack ads that function as a “deliberate mechanism,” which is the language used by political spin doctors, of voter suppression. The goal of non-stop negative advertising is to reduce voter turnout in the interests of another party.

A lot of things now pass for political prowess, for which anyone who loves democracy should hang their head in shame and be condemned from ever standing for election again. This is not about every party getting out and urging everyone to vote, as we have heard people from across the aisle say all day. Over and over again, we have examples of efforts to do exactly the opposite. I am afraid this bill is in that spirit of reducing voter turnout.

We could have, with this bill, pursued the reforms found in private member's Bill C-559, put forward by the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills. That would have led to fairer elections. We could have levelled the playing field for financing so that members of Parliament who come to this place as independents have a fair chance to raise the funds they need to run for re-election. However, we did not.

The ways in which this bill would reduce the potential for a healthy democracy and worsen voter turnout need to be reviewed. Many of my colleagues in this place have given very eloquent, articulate, and full reviews. In particular, I have to give credit and homage to my friend, the hon. member for Toronto—Danforth, whose work on this bill was brilliant.

Let me point out what I would agree with. I may be a minority on this matter, but I do not really think it is a problem to create a commissioner for elections who operates out of the office of public prosecutions. I see that as an independent place. The problem is the government has not given that office any tools. It has not given that officer subpoena powers. What is worse is, for some reason, it has created a “black box” surrounding the work. It would amend the Access to Information Act to remove, from access to information, anything going on in the work of the commissioner for Canada's elections. They would also remove in the Elections Act the requirement to give any information about investigations.

What I also would agree with in this bill is the scheme to deal with the robocalls, to have a way of tracking who buys this kind of automated calling service. That is not bad. I would have voted for that.

However, the bill also includes a big new loophole for the spending of money. It now will not be considered an elections expense to spend money on activities that are considered fundraising for nomination candidates. That is an open door to abuse.

What is the worst part of this bill? This cuts to the core of democracy. This is a charter issue. I turn to a most recent statement by the Supreme Court of Canada on the right of Canadians to vote. It was a decision of October 2012. We are all familiar with it. It is in the name of the current member for Etobicoke Centre, so I will not say the name of the case. However, it was a strong decision written by Mr. Justice Rothstein and Mr. Justice Moldaver.

They had this to say:

The right of every citizen to vote, guaranteed by s. 3 of the Charter, lies at the heart of Canadian democracy.

In this instance, they did not find that those rights had been trampled upon, but that was because a lot of the provisions this bill would remove were in place. Therefore, I think this quote from the Supreme Court is timely and informs us, as my friend, the member for Victoria, recently pointed out, that this bill is probably unconstitutional. The following is what the Supreme Court had to say at the bottom of page 98 of the decision:

Our system strives to treat candidates and voters fairly, both in the conduct of elections and in the resolution of election failures. As we have discussed, the Act seeks to enfranchise all entitled persons,...

A voter can establish Canadian citizenship verbally, by oath.

That cannot happen any more, not with this bill.

The court went on to say:

The goal of accessibility can only be achieved if we are prepared to accept some degree of uncertainty that all who voted were entitled to do so.

The Conservative members of the House and the minister have utterly failed to provide any evidentiary background for the notion that we have a crisis of voter fraud in this country. There is no evidence for the notion that Canadians are covering themselves up through creating false IDs and voting more than once. The crisis in Canadian democracy is not that Canadians are voting more than once, it is that they are voting less than once, and this bill would worsen Canadians' trust in the system and increase cynicism.

As for the treatment of the Chief Electoral Officer, talk about sharper teeth: they are all sharpened in the direction of going after Marc Mayrand. I find this shocking. He is a public servant, he is doing his job, and the job that was being done is now essentially going to be stifled.

When I worked on my last book, which was on the crisis in Canadian democracy ironically, I wanted to try to get to the bottom of why young people were not voting. Where could I find good research that informed that discussion? I found that good research because it was commissioned by Elections Canada. It started to inform political parties what we should do to ensure civic literacy and political understanding from the earliest possible moment.

I think it undermines political responsibility and civic understanding to refer to voters as customers. There is something fundamentally wrong with an Elections Act that talks about customer service when we are talking about voting. It is a right. It is not shopping, and every Canadian must be allowed to vote.

I cannot tell members how heartbreaking it is to hear from people, particularly young people, who have been turned away at the polls because they found that multiple forms of ID did not work. I remember hearing from a young woman in Dawson City when I was holding a town hall there on democracy. She said that she had tried twice. I asked her if she would keep trying and she said she did not know if there was any point, that they did not want her to vote.

I remember the tears in the eyes of an older man in Pictou County who had voted in his polling station during his 75 years until these new changes were brought in by the current administration and he was denied the right to vote because he could not produce a photo ID. He did not have a driver's licence. His sister in law was working at the polling station, but under the rules she was not allowed to vouch for him because she had not gone there for that purpose. Under this new act, we would see more and more Canadians turned away, disenfranchised by the false notion that we have a crisis in voter fraud. That is not our crisis.

We need to do everything possible to restore faith among the Canadian public in the health of our democratic system, and this bill takes us in the absolute wrong direction. Why would a governing party do this? Why is there such a rush to disenfranchise Canadians? Is there an election coming right away that we do not know about? Do we have to have all these new rules in place for first nations, seniors, young people, the poor, and the groups that advocate for those parts of our society that are more disenfranchised by having to produce government-issued photo IDs? Is that the point?

I am baffled and appalled and deeply shocked and troubled by this bill. The things in it that are good could have been so much better, but the things that are bad are unforgivable in a democracy.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and for Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the member's discourse

I noticed though that in the returning officers' post mortem of the 41st general election, they being the people who actually run the elections in each of the 308 ridings across this country, they identified one of the big problems and obstacles to voter turnout being that people did not know where to vote, when to vote, and what ID to bring.

On page 17 of the report they also identified the fact that some of the polling stations were too busy, which discouraged people from voting. They believe that ought to be Elections Canada's primary function in the next election in order to increase turnout. That is what the people who run the elections in 308 ridings across this country said was the biggest obstacle to voter turnout.

Additionally, I draw members' attention to page 25, subsection 143(3), which says, not with respect to vouching but the following:

If the address contained in the piece or pieces of identification provided...does not prove the elector’s residence but is consistent with information related to the elector that appears on the list of electors, the elector’s residence is deemed to have been proven.

That means that if the ID cannot be proven, the polling officer still has the right to give that person a ballot, not disenfranchising anyone, but making sure the person who votes is the actual person who should be voting. That is—

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. The hon. member for Saanich—Gulf Islands.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, regarding this whole notion that we have a problem of proving who a voter is before they vote, again, the Supreme Court has dealt with that.

If we want to ensure that section 3 of the charter is upheld, certain levels of uncertainty must be accepted. They are very minor; we do not have people voting more than once.

How does the hon. parliamentary secretary deal with the fact that people who vote by absentee ballot do not have to produce photo ID?

This whole thing is a nonsense designed to reduce voter turnout.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to put a question to my colleague who just spoke. I wanted to ask her a question about the public education role played by Elections Canada. It is responsible for educating Canadians, especially young people. It is most important that we educate them about their right to vote and how, when they are 18 years old, they can exercise this privilege that we have in Canada. I asked a few questions about this today, but she did not talk about it a lot.

Can she talk about the measure that has been introduced in this bill, which will prevent Elections Canada from engaging in any type of communication other than telling voters when, how and where to vote? This obviously excludes Election Canada's mandate to educate young people in particular about their right to vote. What does she think about this being eliminated by the bill?

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I agree completely with the member for Sherbrooke. I only talked about the research functions of the Chief Electoral Officer, but it is also very important—I would even say mandatory and fundamental—to invest in education, especially of our youth.

I hope that when the next election is held, all members and parties in Canada will renew their efforts to make young people aware of the importance of voting.

[Wladyslaw Lizon, Conservative, Mississauga East—Cooksville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in the little time I have, I would like to make a few comments.

I am disappointed with the debate taking place here. I listened to the argument across the aisle that when people have to show their ID, it will decrease voter turnout.

We hear a lot about rights. How about duties? We Canadians have a duty to this country. When people who come here from all corners of the world become Canadians, they are taught and then asked about what is both their right and duty at the same time. The right to vote is a duty to vote. It is our duty, as Canadian citizens, to shape the future of this country. It is not only the job of Elections Canada to make sure that the information gets to people; it is the duty of all of us. For parents, it is the way that they bring up their children.

Young Canadians, years ago, went to fight and died for the democratic rights and privileges we enjoy today in this country. I went to the cemetery in Groesbeek, Holland, last year. I walked and I looked at the headstones. Those boys were as young as 16 and 17.

Today, people are fighting in many places in the world to get the basic democratic right to vote and to have their say. We here in the House are saying that we cannot ask people this and that, but that we have to encourage them. No. We have to make sure that people are brought up in a way so that they love this country and feel and know that the future of Canada is the duty of us all.

We are shaping the future of this country. We do not only have the right. Do not speak only of rights; speak about duties. We all have duties and responsibilities to this great country. Let us never forget that.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

It being 6:15 p.m., pursuant to an order made Thursday, February 6, 2014, it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the second reading stage of the bill now before the House.

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.