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.

Opposition Motion—Proposed Changes to the Elections Act

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, this motion is all about the struggle for the vote.

I think it is important for this place to be reminded that it was not until 1918 that women could finally vote in a federal election. I would like to credit Alberta's own Nellie McClung for her strong efforts across the country to ensure that women could exercise their suffrage at the provincial, local, and federal level.

It was not until 1960 that Canada's first nation peoples were allowed to vote with no strings attached and without giving up their aboriginal rights.

However, as many in this place have mentioned, there has been broad concern across Canada over the decrease in voter turnout. Therefore, the last thing we would expect the government of the day to do is to put measures in place that would put further barriers in place, making it difficult for people to exercise their franchise.

An open, fair, and inclusive electoral system is the foundation of a modern democracy. The right to vote is now enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is not a minor matter. Jean-Pierre Kingsley has been quoted as saying, “Canada's electoral system is often mentioned as an international model for both its fairness and effectiveness”.

Because of our reputation for having a credible electoral system, Canadians have been invited to serve as election monitors in elections around the world, recently, in Ukraine. I had the privilege, in 2012, of attending in Ukraine to help monitor its election. Other members attended again last December, and we are going to be welcoming those invitations again.

I had the privilege in the last week to travel with colleagues from this place to two African countries, Mozambique and Madagascar. These are lesser developed nations that have gone through war and suffered extreme poverty. Yet, they have established electoral commissions and are bending over backwards to educate the populace and get them enumerated to enable them to vote. However, here we are moving in reverse.

We should perhaps be shamefaced going overseas, professing to have expertise in the democratic electoral process, when the current Conservative government is moving to a more regressive version. We might have to have election monitors here, to engage and encourage us on how we can make our process more democratic.

Today we have a motion put forward by the member for Toronto—Danforth, which says, in part:

That, in the opinion of the House, proposed changes to the Elections Act that would prohibit vouching, voter education programming by Elections Canada, and the use of voter cards as identification...

The concern is that first-time voters would be disenfranchised, including youth and new Canadians, aboriginal Canadians, and our seniors living in residence.

I wish to speak to the process deployed in the passage of these proposed election laws.

Reforms have been long awaited. Many times, the ministers of the government of the time stood in their places and said that any day they were going to table an election law, but then they would withdraw it. We have been waiting for quite some time. Everyone agrees in this place that we do need some reform to the law going forward to the next election, which will be within a year or year and a half. It is important that we have enough time to get these laws in place and that Elections Canada be ready for them.

The question is, why now the rush, having waited so long to bring forward changes?

The Conservatives have brought the bill forward with no consultation with Elections Canada, which is in breach of past protocols. It is also a breach of the past protocol to not consult all the parties. Again, in my visit to these developing African nations, those governments have reached out to their opposition members. What kind of example is the Conservative government setting? Why the need to fast-track Bill C-23?

A reasonable request was made to have the bill immediately go to committee so that more substantial amendments could be made. We had the public calling for more time to consult, and there have been calls by our party to take this bill across Canada to hear from Canadians, all of which has been denied.

Despite the significant issues identified, we are rushing the bill through. We plea once again with the government to apply some common sense, dignity, and democratic process to the reform of the most critical law in our nation, the right to exercise one's franchise.

I would like to speak to a couple of issues under the bill that are raised in the motion. One issue is the proposed prohibition of vouching and any reliance on voter ID cards.

As has been mentioned by many of my colleagues, in the past there has been some level of reliance on vouching. Why is that? It is because there are some members of our society who simply do not have readily available identification. In my riding of Edmonton—Strathcona, within the city of Edmonton and province of Alberta, it is well known across the country and by the government of the day who brag regularly about the work that has been created in Alberta. It suggests that people should move to Alberta. There are jobs, and it welcomes people from other countries to work in Alberta, in many cases in the oil sands.

As a result, we have an incredibly mobile population. In going door to door in three successive elections, I can attest to the fact that many people had just moved in. They had moved across the city, relocated, had no mail with their address, no licence with their new address, and so on. At household after household, we were giving out information on how people could be enumerated. It would be a very serious problem if we took away the voter ID cards, and particularly if we also took away the vouching.

I can also attest to the serious concerns expressed by university students in my riding. I am privileged to have three university campuses in my riding, and there is an additional campus across the river in another riding. I have received letters, from the students' unions from MacEwan University, University of Alberta, and King's University. Those students' unions were all voicing deep concern about the removal of the opportunity for vouching. Why? In many circumstances, as many have attested, students share a residence and only one name will be on the lease or on the bills that come to the house. They have no way of proving their place of residence.

I can attest that I personally have seen young students coming to vote in my riding who have been turned away. Parents have arrived with them, and they are still turned away. In other cases, students have been misinformed and told they must vote in the town they come from, that they cannot vote where they go to university. We need to move in the direction of enabling our youth to vote, not discouraging them.

Second is the category of first nation peoples. In my city, there are many first nation people who, sadly, are displaced, homeless, even though the city is trying to address that. There are wonderful services, including the Boyle Street society, which at the time of an election come forward to assist homeless people. They vouch for them to enable them to vote. They have personally expressed deep sadness to me, that by banning vouching for the people who are trying to exercise their rights, they are going to be banned from that opportunity.

Additionally, as I am sure is the case for all members of this place, there are many seniors residences and long-term care institutions in my riding. We were told by the operators of these institutes that on many occasions they have had to vouch for the residents so that they could vote.

The obvious question is, why is the government moving to disenfranchise these voters? We have not heard one credible or rational argument for this. We should be encouraging people to vote. We heard the government trying to defend that this practice has to be undone because Mr. Neufeld, who was commissioned by Elections Canada to advise on reviewing the act, said there was fraud and that vouching needed to be removed. He has since clearly stated that at no time did he suggest that ineligible voters have deliberately tried to cast illegal ballots. The only other information provided by the minister to the House was information that misled the House and has since been withdrawn. We still await the rationale for disenfranchising over 100,000 voters.

Finally, on voter education, the public, many experts, and certainly my colleagues, are stunned that the government is choosing to diminish the powers and mandate of the Chief Electoral Officer and his officers to educate and encourage the public to vote.

My final point is that I am absolutely dismayed at the decision to deny the strongest recommendation from Mr. Mayrand, which was to give him the powers of investigation to compel evidence. There can only be two reasons for this, both of which are reprehensible.

One is that the government is intentionally blocking the ability of Elections Canada to enforce the act. The second is that it simply does not understand the enforcement system.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, at the outset I say that I will be sharing my time with the member for Edmonton—Strathcona.

Bill C-23 has been criticized as undemocratic by academics, elections officials, and, more importantly, by many Canadian citizens. Just this morning, on my trip to Ottawa, I had a chance to read The Globe and Mail. It has been editorializing on Bill C-23 for over six days now, sharing more information on this unfair elections act than the government is with Canadians.

I thank The Globe and Mail. In today's piece, it decried the bill, saying to kill this bill for the good of the country. I could not agree more with what the The Globe and Mail's editorial said.

I would like to share some more of what I read today:

The government has touted the bill’s changes to voting rules as needed to prevent voter fraud. That’s a red herring. There is no evidence that vouching, a process the bill eliminates, led to widespread fraud. The government has resorted to defending itself with out of context citations from experts, whose conclusions are the opposite of what the government pretends. Tightening the rules will prevent many eligible Canadians from voting; those affected are mostly not Conservative voters.

Other changes create a giant, partisan loophole in campaign spending laws, to the advantage of the Conservatives. Why? The bill gives incumbent parties in each riding the power to name key election officials, instead of leaving the job to an impartial Elections Canada. Why? Bill C-23 also takes direct aim at Elections Canada in other ways – neutering its ability to conduct public outreach campaigns and encourage voting. Why? It also meddles with Elections Canada’s ability to investigate wrongdoing or communicate the results of investigations. Why?

It is not just me or The Globe and Mail; many Canadians are asking the same questions. Why are the Conservatives trying to stop voters, stop Canadians, from actually participating in our general elections? Time and time again, experts have been saying that Bill C-23 aims to fix problems that are not really there.

The bill is actually exacerbating the real problem with Canada's electoral system, which is low voter engagement. Voter participation is low, and engaging new voters in a time when Canadians are cynical about government is an uphill battle. Why are the Conservatives trying to make voting harder, when we should be making it easier and as accessible as possible? The answer is simple, and very discouraging: it is because the unfair elections bill makes it easier for the Conservatives to win. They want to make it harder for people who do not vote Conservative to vote at all.

Hundreds of thousands of Canadians rely on vouching and voter identification cards to prove that they have the right to vote. This is especially true for young people, new Canadians, aboriginal people, and seniors living in residence. Bill C-23 would put an end to vouching practices. Vouching has long been an accepted practice; not everyone has the financial means to secure an ID, and not everyone in Canada is wealthy.

Aboriginal people, university students living away from home, the homeless, and seniors in residence are all groups that are less likely to have eligible ID or mail on hand, thus requiring someone to vouch for them. In the last election, approximately 100,000 people used vouching to exercise their right to vote.

In addition, voter cards will no longer be accepted to confirm identification. The use of voter ID cards, the notice of registration on the electoral list that is sent to voters, benefits those who face challenges in establishing their address when it is time to vote. Examples are youth on campus, seniors, and aboriginal people. Many aboriginal people wait months to get their treaty cards. They may not have access to alternative forms of ID. Elderly couples may need to have a spouse vouch for them, because only one of their names was on the registered mail.

The rate of error is very small when using voter ID cards, and the allowance worked to enfranchise many, so why get rid of it? The only reason I can see is to disenfranchise voters.

My riding of Scarborough—Rouge River is large and diverse. We have a high population of new Canadians who may face some difficulties when they go to the polls next election. For some, the 2015 election will be their first opportunity to vote federally. What a warm welcome to their new home to be told they cannot vote.

We also have the highest youth-to-population ratio in the greater Toronto area in Scarborough—Rouge River. There are approximately 32,000 people between the ages of 18 and 34. The national youth survey conducted by Elections Canada after the 2011 election found that among Canadians aged 18 to 34 who did not vote, 15% said that their decision was influenced by their inability to provide proof of identification, while another 16% indicated that they were influenced by their inability to provide proof of address.

However, members need not take my word for it. Although the Conservatives did not feel the need to consult the Chief Electoral Officer, Marc Mayrand, he had more than enough to say about vouching in testimony that he provided at the procedure and House affairs committee that we know the Conservatives wish they could forget. Luckily for us and for all of Canada, it is on the public record.

The Chief Electoral Officer, when he spoke at the committee, had this to say on vouching:

It has been pointed out that vouching is a complex procedure and that numerous procedural irregularities were found to have been committed at the last general election in connection with vouching. It is critical to understand that, as recognized by the Supreme Court of Canada, the vast majority of these were strictly record-keeping errors by poll workers documenting the vouching process, and not fraud or even irregularities that could compromise an election. There is no evidence tying these errors to ineligible electors being allowed to vote.

That is a fairly clear demonstration that vouching is not leading to election fraud.

When asked publicly about why they would ban vouching and the use of voter information cards, Conservatives say that it is because they are trying to cut down on fraud. However, that does not make sense. We know they are not cracking down on fraud. Elections Canada has been clear that there is no evidence to suggest that vouching or the use of voter information cards has actually led to fraud. There is no evidence to suggest vouching or voter information cards are connected to electoral fraud. There is no evidence to show that this legislation would be justified in ending vouching and ending the use of voter information cards.

The only example of voter fraud using voter ID cards that the Conservatives could give us was, of course, the statement by the member for Mississauga—Streetsville that he had witnessed with his own two eyes that voter fraud was happening using voter ID cards. Of course, as the House knows now, this was not the case, which invites the question of why the member for Mississauga—Streetsville brought it up if he knew it was not true.

Unfortunately, this unfair elections act is not just an attack on voter access but also on education. Bill C-23 would strip the Chief Electoral Officer's power to engage in public education. Under the unfair elections act, the Chief Electoral Officer would be limited to discussing only certain aspects of the electoral process: when, where, and how to vote. That is literally the least amount of information that the Chief Electoral Officer and Elections Canada could give to Canadians. That is all they would be allowed to say. This is absolutely not a way to increase voter participation. This is very much a departure from many western democracies.

Traditionally, bodies that oversee elections have the mandate to educate the public on how to vote. If Elections Canada is not allowed to do the job, then who will? The Conservatives are counting on the probability that nobody will. The Conservatives would rather change the rules of the game than play by the rules. We know that with their majority government, the Conservatives have been writing their own rules, making them up as they go along.

Unfortunately, the Conservatives have a track record of breaking election laws with their in-and-out scheme, robocalls designed to suppress opposition votes, and rule-breaking overspending by Conservatives ministers, not to mention charges against the Prime Minister's former ethics spokesperson, the MP for Peterborough.

The Conservatives had a chance with Bill C-23 to do the right thing and introduce a bill to crack down on real electoral fraud, but they could not stop themselves from tacking on cynical measures designed to tilt the playing field in their favour and make it harder for some groups of Canadians to vote. As I said before, those include young people, seniors, aboriginal people, and homeless people.

I want to say one last thing. As The Globe and Mail's editorial said this morning, for the good of this country, let us kill this bill.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise in the House today to express my views regarding the New Democratic Party's opposition day motion concerning various reforms the fair elections act would bring to voter identification procedures under the Canada Elections Act.

The motion before the House also deals with the effects of these important reforms for specific groups in Canadian society. My remarks today will focus on this dimension of the issue and will demonstrate why the fair elections act would have beneficial effects on the voting rights of the groups listed in the motion.

I welcome this debate today, because it gives me an opportunity not only to contribute my perspective on what the real impacts of the voter identification reforms and the fair election act would be for the groups specified in the motion before us today but also because it will be an opportunity to provide colleagues with some of my thoughts on the multiple and significant advantages the fair elections act would bring to Canada's electoral system. In particular, I would like to highlight the importance of upholding the integrity of our elections and of protecting Canadians' right to vote.

I would like to make it clear to the House from the outset, however, that I disagree with the motion put forward by the New Democratic Party today regarding the bill.

The motion would have the House pronounce an opinion against the needed reforms the fair election act would bring to the current voter identification procedures set out in the Canada Elections Act. Furthermore, the motion would have Canadians believe that the fair elections act would have negative effects on the voting rights of the groups specified in today's motion, but I am pleased to say that nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, the fair elections act would have just the opposite purpose, that of protecting all Canadians' electoral rights from the risks of fraudulent voting and high rates of administrative errors, factors that can undermine confidence in the integrity of elections.

I would like to begin my remarks today with a few preliminary observations regarding the important enhancements the fair elections act would bring to our electoral system. The fair elections act proposes comprehensive changes to the Canada Elections Act. It is unquestionably important legislation that will reinforce the integrity of Canada's elections and will revitalize our democracy.

An element of particular relevance in today's debate is that the fair elections act would provide better customer service for voters by focusing Elections Canada's advertising on the basics of voting: where and when and what identification to bring. This measure will benefit all Canadians, including by facilitating the voting processes for all the specific groups referenced in today's motion.

For example, Elections Canada concluded in its evaluation report on the 41st general election that a top priority to increase youth turnout would be, and I quote, “increasing awareness about when, where and how to vote, by providing information in formats suitable for youth”. The fair elections act would ensure that Elections Canada would focus its communications messages on this crucial information for our electors.

I would like to add that the act would also establish an extra day of advance polling. The proposed change would give Canadians access to four advance polling days: the 10th, 9th, 8th, and the 7th days before election day. This important measure would also benefit all Canadians, including, again, those specific groups in society that are the subject of our debate today.

This would be an appropriate point to note that among the most important initiatives included in the act are measures to combat voter fraud and increase the confidence of Canadians in the electoral process. I think all members can agree that the prevention of electoral fraud is a very worthwhile goal and that every fraudulent vote not only undermines confidence in our elections but also, in effect, cancels out the legitimate vote of a Canadian.

In light of the fact that the motion before the House today refers specifically to the prohibitions in the fair elections act on the use of the vouching procedure and the voter information cards as replacements for acceptable identification, I would at this point like to take a few additional minutes to outline for the House precisely why it is imperative that those practices be prohibited.

I will first provide a little background information to explain precisely how the use of the vouching mechanism and the voter information cards for identification purposes relate to the current voter identification procedures under the Canada Elections Act.

With the passage of Bill C-31 in 2007, a mechanism was introduced for verifying the identity of electors and their residence upon registration at the polls and for voting. This was a significant advancement that our government brought to voter identification for federal elections in Canada. It helped bring us closer to restoring the confidence of Canadians in the electoral process.

As a result of those legislative changes, an elector voting in a federal election at an ordinary polling station must prove his or her identity in one of three ways. The first is by presenting one piece of identification issued by a government that includes a photograph of the elector and his or her name and address. The second is by presenting two pieces of identification, each of which establishes the elector's name and one of which establishes the elector's address. The third is by taking an oath, if accompanied by another elector whose name appears on the list of electors and who, after providing the piece or pieces of identification referred to, vouches for the elector on an oath. That is what is known as the vouching process.

There are certain safeguards in place that are intended to make the vouching process more reliable and accurate. For example, the voucher must have the required pieces of identification. He or she cannot previously have been vouched for. The voucher must reside in the same polling division as the elector. The voucher can only vouch for one elector; multiple vouching is prohibited. Most importantly, there is also supposed to be a record of who the voucher is and who he or she vouched for. This ought to create an effective deterrent to anybody who gives thought to vouching for an unqualified elector. However, in practice, those safeguards are undermined by the fact that there are high levels of irregularities being reported at the polls regarding the use of vouching.

Studies commissioned by Elections Canada demonstrate mass irregularities in the use of vouching. According to the Neufeld report relating to administrative deficiencies at the polls in the 2011 election, vouching procedures are complex, and there were irregularities in 42% of cases where vouching was used.The report indicates that even with increased quality assurance, the problem would not be remedied. The report found that in 38% of the cases where vouching was required, there was no record in the poll book that clearly indicated both who the voters and the vouchers were. This clearly does not mean that all of these cases were instances of voter fraud. However, it does mean that polling day irregularities by elections officers regularly undermine an essential safeguard in the vouching mechanism, which is to have a record of who vouched for whom.

While Elections Canada has estimated that as many as 120,000 voters chose to use the vouching procedure on election day, those voters could have proven their identity and their residence by other means. The fair elections act will require in law that Elections Canada communicate what forms of identification would be acceptable at polling locations. This important measure would provide voters with the basic information they need about what identification to bring to the polls before they go to the polls.

I would also add a few words about the measures in the fair elections act regarding voter information cards, which play an important role in informing Canadians about where and when they need to vote. It is important to recognize that voter information cards are not currently authorized forms of identification and cannot be used as proof of identification and residency. Since the voter identification requirements were established in 2007, we have had one general election when voter information cards were permitted to be used on an exceptional basis and one general election when they were not authorized forms of identification at all.

Potentially serious problems could arise if those cards were used as replacements for acceptable identification, since there is evidence that the use of voter information cards as identification presents the risk of voter fraud. For instance, studies commissioned by Elections Canada showed a one-in-six error rate on voter information cards. Such inaccuracies could allow those attempting to subvert election laws to use them to vote more than once or to vote in the wrong riding.

I would like to take a few moments to outline the current situation regarding the various forms of identification available to voters and to address the question of whether the reforms in the fair elections act would have any effect on their availability. This will illustrate quite clearly that the important voter identification measures contained in the fair elections act would not in any way disenfranchise the groups mentioned in today's motion: first-time voters, such as young people and new Canadians; aboriginal Canadians; and seniors living in residences.

I would also like to emphasize that the flexibility of the Canada Elections Act would not change. Rather, the goal of the fair elections act is, as I mentioned earlier, to prohibit only those specific administrative procedures that are risky and counterproductive, in particular the use of vouching and voter information cards as replacements for acceptable identification. In this way, it would minimize the risks of fraud and error in the voting process.

Nevertheless, even with the new protections introduced by the fair elections act, voters would still be able to choose from among 39 forms of authorized identification to prove their identity and residence, including a lease, bank statements, library cards, hunting licenses, Canadian Forces identity cards, and many more. In fact, the current authorized list includes not only about two dozen different kinds of identity cards but also a wide variety of original documents that contain a name and an address.

I would like to emphasize that this latter point is of particular importance with respect to certain groups in society that for various reasons may face challenges in proving their identity and residence. I would like to take a moment to elaborate on this point.

The kinds of original documents with a name and address that are among the 39 forms of authorized identification include a statement of government benefits, which would be employment insurance, old age security, social assistance, disability support, or a child tax benefit. It is unquestionable that this option would facilitate the identification process, for example, for seniors who live in a residence. They would be able to use their old age security statements to provide identification at the polls.

Moreover, the list of original documents considered to be suitable identification for the purposes of voting would also include letters from a public curator, a public guardian, or a public trustee. It could be documentation, such as a letter of stay or an admission form, issued by the responsible authority of a shelter, a soup kitchen, a students residence, a seniors residence, or a long-term care facility.

Clearly the option of presenting a letter from the responsible authority of a student or seniors residence could be quite useful for seniors who live in a residence or for young first-time voters who may be students living away from home while they attend an educational institution. Students would also have the ability to use correspondence issued by a school, college, or university to provide their identification. All of this would be in addition to the fact that student identification cards and old age security cards are both authorized forms of identification.

I have not yet mentioned the forms of authorized identification that would be of specific benefit to aboriginal Canadians. Specifically, the forms of identification authorized by the Chief Electoral Officer would include certificates of Indian status, also known as status cards. This is in addition to attestations of residence issued by the responsible authority of a first nations band or reserve.

I would also like to emphasize at this point that the Chief Electoral Officer would continue to authorize acceptable forms of identification at the polls. Furthermore, the Chief Electoral Officer would be encouraged to continue his efforts to ensure that the list of authorized identification contains documents to allow those with particular challenges in proving their identity and their residence to be able to do so. In fact, this is the central message of my remarks here today in the House.

The fair elections act would do nothing to detract from the flexibility and adaptability that is inherent in the current system of voter identification under the Canada Elections Act.

The government recognizes that these are key strengths of our electoral system, and as a consequence, the reforms in the fair elections act would serve to enhance those positive elements in the current system while minimizing the very real risks of electoral fraud.

With specific regard to new Canadians, those who are eligible electors would have been resident in Canada for some time prior to obtaining their citizenship and being able to vote in their first election, and so would not face greater challenges than any other Canadian in obtaining one or more of the 39 forms of authorized identification I have just talked about.

Additionally, I would like to note that Elections Canada has produced, in 27 languages in addition to English and French, a document concerning voter identification at the polls, which is intended to make this important information more easily accessible to voters from ethnocultural communities.

The fair elections act would do nothing to impede such important and fundamental advertising on the basics of voting: where, when, and what identification to bring. In fact, the fair elections act would ensure that Elections Canada focuses its advertising on this crucial information.

The reforms that the fair elections act would bring to the voter identification procedures under the Canada Elections Act are important and much needed measures that would help to ensure that our electoral system operates with the integrity that all Canadians expect and deserve.

In particular, the prohibitions in the fair elections act on vouching and the use of voter information cards as replacements for acceptable identification are designed to protect the vote of Canadians. This certainly includes the specific groups that are mentioned in today's motion: first time voters like youth and new Canadians, aboriginal Canadians, and seniors living in residences.

As I mentioned in my earlier remarks, the fair elections act actually has just the opposite purpose, that of protecting all Canadians' voting rights. With the fair elections act, our government continues to respond to emerging challenges in order to ensure fair elections in which the voice of every voter is counted.

I will bring my remarks to a close today by reiterating my opposition to the motion that has been put forward by the New Democratic Party today concerning the important reforms the fair elections act would bring to Canada's voter identification procedures.

I certainly hope hon. members will join me in opposing this motion and supporting the important changes in the fair elections act.

[Mike Sullivan, NDP, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to talk about this unfair elections bill.

Our elections process is going backwards. For the first time in Canada's history, we are disenfranchising people who have been enfranchised in the past. At every other step of the way, whether it was allowing women or aboriginal people to vote, or providing mechanisms for persons with disabilities or for persons who had difficulty proving their identity, we have always moved forward.

We have always moved to enfranchise people, and the Conservative government is moving backwards for the first time in our history. I think it is shameful.

Canadians expect us to fix some of the problems clearly identified by a number of events over the past, since the 2011 election, and even before that. Those events displayed to Canadians that there was a problem with voting: officials of Elections Canada were not following procedures appropriately; the lists are no good; the lists need to be improved; there is a considerably amount of potential cheating happening by political parties; and Canadians expect us to do something about it.

This bill does not do any of those three things. In fact, the bill makes cheating easier in some circumstances. It has absolutely no impact whatsoever on the list itself and on whether the list will in fact be improved—it will not. In terms of voting, all the bill does is disenfranchise a number of individuals who were able to vote before.

First, the minister and others keep talking about these 39 pieces of ID that Canadians can use. In fact, that is not true. None of them are in the bill. These pieces of ID are set by Elections Canada, with the exception that the bill says voters cannot use the voter information card. There are 38 pieces of ID. Those 38 include 25 pieces of ID that can prove who a person is. Then a person needs to find 1 of 13 pieces of ID to prove where he or she lives.

We are really looking at 13 pieces of ID. Those 13 are sometimes completely unavailable to some individuals. For example, a student living not in residence but at the home of another individual in another city wants to be able to prove that he or she lives there.

Those students do not receive a utility bill. They do not have a bank or credit card statement. They do not have vehicle ownership or insurance there. They do not have correspondence issued by a school, college, or university to that place because that is not their original residence. The correspondence would have gone to their other place. They do not have a statement of government benefits because they are not getting them. They do not have an attestation of residence on a first nations band or reserve. They do not have a government cheque or cheque stub. They do not have a pension plan statement of benefits.

They do not have a lease or a mortgage statement. They do not have income or property tax assessment notices because, again; it goes back to their original home. They do not have an insurance policy. They do not have a letter from a public curator, public guardian, or public trustee. They do not have a letter issued by a shelter, soup kitchen, a student residence, or a long-term care facility because they are not in any of those places.

Those students cannot prove their location. It is physically impossible. The government says there are 39 pieces of ID, but not for a student living not in residence and off-campus in another city. It is impossible for them to prove where they live. What are they to do?

In the days before this bill, these students could have been vouched for by someone who knew them, who did have the ability to prove where they live and who lived in the same riding. Now, that is absolutely being taken away from them. That is wrong.

I want to list three other cases of individuals in my riding who, in the last election, actually voted but who will not be able to vote in the next election because their ability to vouch is being taken away.

One of them was a senior citizen who had been living in the same place for the last 55 years, I think it was. For some reason, the voter information card did not arrive. We know what the reason for that was now: Elections Canada decided to change the postal code to the wrong one; another problem that needs fixing that is not being fixed by this bill.

That individual did not have anything to prove her location of residence. She had nothing, and she was terrified. I knocked at her door and reminded her to go vote. She said, “I cannot vote because I cannot prove where I live. I did not get a voter information card, which I would normally have used. I cannot do it now because I cannot prove where I live. I do not have my name on anything here.”

Her husband was standing next to her, and I told him that he could vouch for her. All he had to do was take her to the polling station, and with his ID he could vouch for her. They were overjoyed. However, that would be gone. The next time they would not be able to do that.

Another senior in my riding, who has lived in Canada for about 40 years, cannot get Ontario picture ID. She has been trying for two years. She cannot get it because she does not have the appropriate ID. She has a Canadian citizenship certificate, but it is not the card type; it is the big certificate type, which they will not accept in Ontario. She has a birth certificate, but it is from the wrong country, which they do not accept in Ontario. She has a passport. However, again, it is from the wrong country, which they do not accept in Ontario. She cannot get Ontario picture ID. She is in a position of not being able to use picture ID. She does not have the right kind of ID to vote in terms of proving where she lives. That is the nub of this problem, being able to prove where one lives.

She is now in the process of spending $130, which she does not have because she is a senior, to buy herself a passport. That passport will give her the ability to go to the Ontario government to prove who she is so she can get an Ontario picture ID card. That will cost her another $60. She is spending $190 to get enough ID to vote next time.

Why is it that Canadians have to spend money to vote? That should not happen, but that is happening in her case. It is going to take months. If this happened during the writ period, she would never be able to do that.

Finally, we have a person on disability payments, whose door I knocked on in the last election. I told her that she just needed to show the cheque stub that comes from the Ontario disability system to prove where she lives. She had nothing else. Persons on disability in Ontario are very impoverished. She could not afford cable or a phone, and she had no hydro bill. She had nothing to prove where she lived. Therefore, I suggested that she use the cheque stub.

A stub from a government cheque is a legitimate way of proving one's address. The trouble is, the Ontario government does not put a name and address on the stub. It is only on the cheque itself, which had already been deposited. She had no way of proving her address. In her case, she managed to find somebody in the building who would vouch for her; otherwise, she would not have been able to vote.

Those are three examples.

There is also the issue that Canadians want us to deal with of potential cheating by political parties during an election. There have been a number of allegations, news stories, and various things about robocalls, which were delivered to people to fraudulently send them to the wrong polling station. There were a number of issues regarding overspending by political candidates. There were issues regarding overspending by political parties, particularly the in-and-out scandal of 2006.

However, none of those issues are being dealt with in this proposed legislation. There would not be a way for Elections Canada to investigate properly, to subpoena evidence, to compel testimony, or force a political party to actually disclose what it has done. In fact, the bill goes one step further. It would permit a political party, in the guise of campaign fundraising, to have no limits on what it spends on communications with constituents, or with all of Canada.

The minister can correct me if I am wrong, but I doubt very much that the Conservative Party would give out a list of who it has sent communications to if asked by Elections Canada. The Conservatives have not been very forthcoming to this point, and I doubt they would do that to prove that individuals they communicated with have donated money in the past five years. That is unlikely and not going to happen. They are going to send stuff out willy-nilly. That is what will happen.

We would have no limit to the amount of communications that the party can send out during an election writ period, even though right now there is a limit on the amount of money that can be spent during an election. That is a very damaging piece of this puzzle.

I appreciate the time to explain why Bill C-23 does not work, and I urge members opposite to rethink their position and defeat the bill. Take a kill-the-bill position, as we like to say it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member suggested that we go back to the fundamentals of Bill C-23. The government likes to call it the fair elections act. Nothing could be further from reality. For all intents and purposes, it is a Conservative elections act, and I do not say that lightly, in the sense that we have received very little. The only support I have detected for this legislation comes from the Prime Minister's Office and members of the Conservative Party. There is no other political entity in Canada that I am aware of that endorses this legislation. Elections Canada has very real problems with this legislation. It is weakening our elections laws. There was no consultation done. This deals with a fundamental pillar of our democracy and the government is forcing this legislation through using its majority.

Does the member not see the irony of a majority Conservative government forcing through changes to elections laws, given the many other events taking place around the world, especially when academics and others around the world are saying that what the government is doing with the elections laws is wrong? Why does he not recognize that what is happening to the fundamental principle of democracy with this piece of legislation is wrong?

Democratic Reform

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

Mr. Speaker, last week 19 international scholars published a letter calling the fair elections act a threat to Canada's reputation as “...one of the world's guardians of democracy and human rights”. This was just one week after 159 experts here in Canada published a letter condemning the minister as a threat against democracy.

Today, a national newspaper ran an editorial with the headline simply, “Kill this bill”.

Will the Conservatives stop treating Bill C-23 as a piece of partisan legislation that is only to be rammed through Parliament?

Opposition Motion—Proposed changes to the Elections Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to emphasize in regard to Bill C-23 that we need to acknowledge it is fundamentally flawed. It is flawed to the degree that we have had editorials, and many different stakeholders from across the country who have expressed a great deal of disappointment, saying that the bill would be better off being killed than being allowed to continue in its current fashion.

I wonder if the member would support the idea that the government should leave the bill, work with opposition parties, with Elections Canada, and with other stakeholders, who have a vested interest in ensuring that Canada has good sound election laws. These would be election laws that would, for example, allow the Chief Electoral Officer to have the ability to compel witnesses.

We would be far better off doing this overhaul of Bill C-23, as opposed to even attempting to have it passed in its current state. Would the member not agree with that?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I had the opportunity to sit through some of the committee meetings regarding Bill C-23, where it became very clear that the government has been negligent on this whole file. The member accurately portrays the sentiment of a good number of Canadians that Bill C-23 should go nowhere.

There are just too many fundamental flaws in the bill. One of the greatest, in my opinion, concerns the ability of the Chief Electoral Officer to compel witness testimony. That is so very important. When the Chief Electoral Officer was before the committee, I had an opportunity to question him directly regarding that. At the end of the day, we would have weakened election laws as a direct result of the bill.

Would the member comment on how badly this legislation needs to be amended. If the Conservative government continues to use its majority to pass the bill, is it not a slap in the face of democracy? Does the bill not, at the very least, need to be substantially amended, if not killed outright?

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

Mr. Speaker, I stand here among volumes of papers and consultations from the academic world, both national, domestic, and international, as well as editorials, and all of this is piling up against this particular act. The Globe and Mail was so bold as to say this morning in its headline, “Kill this bill”, period. This was following a five-piece editorial submission by The Globe and Mail, which basically takes this bill apart.

In the National Post, there is full comment under the headline, “Don’t undermine Elections Canada”. It was a letter sent in by not just a couple of academics. Sometimes when there is legislation in the House, a couple of academics will write in, saying that they have spent a lifetime studying a subject and write serious papers and dissertations about it. In this case, there were not a couple, not 10, not 20, not even 50, but 160 academics who signed a letter with the headline, “Don’t undermine Elections Canada”, against this bill.

I repeat for the sake of Hansard and everybody watching at home, 160 experts signed this letter saying that this is not the way to go, and what is being purported by the government through the minister, originating from the PMO one can only assume, is that this is a systematic and very clandestine way of supporting voting suppression, at least the beginning stages of it.

I want to quote from The Globe and Mail because it had a couple of good things to say this morning about this, which I think is very pertinent to the conversation. It said:

The government has resorted to defending itself with out of context citations from experts,....

I will address that a little later and it was talked about earlier. It went on to state:

...[the] conclusions are the opposite of what the government pretends. Tightening the rules will prevent many eligible Canadians from voting; those affected are mostly not Conservative voters.

Therein lies, at the base of this, something that the Conservatives are attempting to do in a very clandestine way. There are some provisions in this bill that Liberals accept, such as the transmission of results across the country. Obviously, technology dictates that is something we should do, and other provisions, but at the core of this, as the member who moved this motion today pointed out, are five areas that we consider subtle ways, but as time goes on we realize it is not as subtle as they originally attempted, which was put forward by 160 academics.

I want to quote from the letter that the academics sent in. Remember that these are local academics. International academics have now gotten on board with this as well, saying, “By the way, what Canada is doing is the opposite of what it did in the past”. This is what is called a retrograde policy, as Elections Canada was and, in my opinion, still is a model for global democracy.

Many of us members travel internationally and speak to many our counterparts across the world. I have spent time at the Council of Europe. A while ago, there was a resolution calling on fairer democracies and institutions that uphold fair democracies, but in the report put out by the Council of Europe, the rapporteur also talked about how the intent is to create an independent body that is able to fully investigate situations with potential fraud in the system. I know the minister likes to talk about the independence of this particular office, meaning the commissioner, who is really the sheriff in town, finding out about how election fraud comes about, investigating that with charges to be laid, so on and so forth.

What he has done, though, is made this office independent of Elections Canada and put it into public prosecutions. The independence of this particular office is talked about as being the way to go, but here is the problem. If the tools by which that person can do his or her job are not supplied, then the job cannot be done, whether it is independent or not.

The minister wants to make sure the referee is independent. He wants to make sure that the referee on the ice is wearing the right uniform. The problem is that they did not give him a whistle, so he has to run around shouting to people that they should not do that, which does not make it very effective, does it? The play does not stop unless the whistle is blown, so the referee in this case is ineffective in doing the job on the ice, to carry the analogy further.

I will stop right there with that one, because I do believe that under public prosecutions, the intent may have been there from the beginning, but the follow-up of providing the tools is not there.

The robocalls incident is a perfect illustration of why these tools are needed, and that is why it surfaced through the current CEO of Elections Canada. It was the need to get the testimony to get to the bottom of this issue and find out who was responsible. We all admit in this House that something nefarious was happening, but so far just one person has been charged when we know that more people were involved.

The courts have already cast an opinion saying that the database system used by the Conservatives was at the core of this nefarious activity, but a lot of witnesses were not coming forward with testimony. If the commissioner had the ability to apply to a judge to compel a person to provide the testimony, provided that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is held up, then they would do that.

The Conservatives say that not even police have that authority. That is their argument. However, I would argue that actually the police do have tools similar to what we are asking for.

I use the example of wiretapping. Police can apply to a judge to get permission for wiretapping nefarious activities that have the potential of breaking the law, but they apply to a judge to do that. Lo and behold, a starker contrast would be the fact that there are provinces in this country that already have this ability. Their elections officers have the ability to do it. They do it because it is effective.

Finally, there is federal legislation that says this ability exists within the federal system. It is under the Competition Act. The commissioner there has the ability to apply to a judge to compel testimony in relation to contravening the Competition Act.

The model exists in other jurisdictions. The examples the Conservatives tried to use to refute why they should not have that power are simply not true. Both the CEO and the current commissioner said that the ability to compel testimony is key to finding out who has committed fraud on a massive level, such as in the robocalls situation. In that example, nefarious activity was happening, yet we could not get to the bottom of it for that reason.

I will go back to the letter submitted by the academics. I want to quote from it, because some of the quotes are worth hearing within the context of this debate.

They say:

We see no justification for introducing legislation of such pivotal importance to our democracy without significant consultation with Elections Canada, opposition parties, and the public at large.

Neither of these things was happening.

There was a meeting. I had a meeting with Elections Canada back around late summer. However, in that meeting, specific mention of new legislation was not there. When I spoke to the CEO of Elections Canada as critic for democratic reform, we did briefly talk about the potential of new legislation, so we were talking about it, but I wonder why the minister felt it was not necessary to have that discussion.

I want to quote from this letter again, this time on voter identification, because this is a very important issue.

Because of the ID requirements, a lot of people in my riding in central Newfoundland were not able to vote. They were able to vote later because of the vouching, but certainly it was because they lacked particular ID that mostly those in seniors' residences were not able to do that. There are lots of ID documents that do not have an address associated with them, and since they were living in residences, they did not have utility bills. Those bills would be paid by the residence itself.

Here is what the academics said in their letter:

The use of voter cards is especially important for Canadians who lack ID that proves their current address, such as students, senior citizens in long-term care facilities, First Nations citizens, and those who have recently moved. Although not perfect, VICs are more likely to provide an accurate address than most other forms of ID, including drivers' licenses. We believe that the elimination of VICs as a valid form of ID in federal elections would reduce the likelihood of voting by some citizens.

There is no doubt in their minds that this would happen.

Earlier today, the minister talked about 45,000 incidents that took place with Elections Canada officials when vouching was not recorded. However, as I said in my question, one cannot necessarily draw the conclusion that there were 45,000 incidents of fraud.

Why do we not get to the root cause of this situation? Was there a clerical error that officials were not able to fix at the time? Was it something that Elections Canada officials were not aware they had to do at the time, but the vouching was purely legitimate? These questions were not explored.

We say that the voter identification card, along with the system of vouching itself, does need improving. That is why we are here: to debate amendments that would improve the system. However, we should not throw something out simply because it contains inefficiencies. We should try to fix that system.

Remember, we can say that 45,000 incidents took place, or just over 50,000 incidents of potential fraud, but as has been pointed by the academics and by most people who are against the bill, we could be disenfranchising over 120,000 voters by bringing in this legislation. I know for a fact, because I have seen it myself—and I say that legitimately—that people at the poll were disenfranchised because they did not have ID containing their address.

I assume that at some point before the bill was introduced, the conversation was to fix the system and create efficiencies, but eventually the Conservatives got around to just throwing it out, period, on scant evidence that was just willy-nilly. The Conservatives seem to be saying that because of the so many thousands of people involved in a particular riding, the potential is there for fraud, but they did not investigate further to find out exactly what happened.

Vouching is a system that is used by many democracies throughout the world and, as is pointed out in this letter, by students, first nation citizens, seniors in residence, and people who have just moved.

The academics have also said this:

The Bill also fails to provide the Commissioner with the powers necessary to properly investigate electoral infractions. For example, the Commissioner will not have the power to compel witness testimony, a major stumbling block during the robocalls investigation.

We talked about that earlier.

They talked about campaign finance:

Bill C-23 would make several changes to campaign finance and expense reporting after elections. Taken separately, these changes may seem minor, but together they increase the influence of money in Canadian politics.

Earlier the minister said that Bill C-23 would fix efficiencies in reporting for leadership candidates. He referred to the Liberals, but in fact, what would this have meant for the current Prime Minister in his leadership battle? Nothing was out there—nothing.

I fear that a lot of this is geared toward a particular party or a particular cause and disenfranchises others. It is as though the Conservatives are not gaining something for Elections Canada or taking the opportunity to strengthen Elections Canada in what it does, but are trying to gain an advantage as political players. That is what is most disturbing about this situation.

All of this leads to the same conclusion reached by 160 international academics, The Globe and Mail that I cited earlier, the Toronto Star, major newspapers, and comment in the National Post. The evidence is climbing against this legislation. They are people who are experts in the field who would attack anybody who attacked democracy. They would do it to us, to the NDP, or to the Green Party or the Conservatives. They say that there are egregious attempts within this legislation to isolate voters, when improving the system was there for Conservatives to take advantage of and they chose not to do it.

The motion being put forward today brings up some very important policy about vouchers and voter identification as key stumbling blocks to many people who should be able to vote, but essentially I want to talk as well about how consultation was not there either. That is an incredibly disturbing part of this situation. In terms of putting information out to the average voter to entice a person to vote, the Conservatives talk about how it is up to parties to put out the message to get people to vote for them. It is ironic that a party that spends of millions in negative advertising is saying it is up to parties to convince people to not vote for something, to go to the polls constantly angry, but that is a debate for another day.

Elections Canada has an incredible opportunity to inspire people who have not voted before to go out and vote. There are people in their thirties or forties who have never voted. Motivating people to vote is a key part of Elections Canada, and Elections Canada's ability to inspire people to vote is one of the main reasons the international community cites it as a great international example of democracy.

I have nothing against the idea of putting out more information to tell people where and when to vote, but there has to be another way to inspire them to vote and to give the resources to do it and to communicate with people in an open fashion. If Elections Canada is truly independent, which the minister is now saying it is, he would have no worries about it doing these things, but apparently that is not the case.

Going forward, I hope that we are able to propose, accept, and converse about proper amendments that would fix many of these things that we oppose in the legislation.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. minister. I appreciate the fact that I was consulted in advance of Bill C-23.

In my written submission to the minister, I pointed out that Canada had a crisis of voter turnout and that claims that we had an issue of voter fraud were erroneous and there was no evidence for it. I urged him to further expedite voting by reducing the number of pieces of ID required in various circumstances in changes to the Elections Act that his administration brought forward a number of years ago. He did not give me a hint of what he had planned or I would have been a bit more forceful in my recommendations that the Conservatives not make voting harder for Canadians.

Given that Mr. Neufeld's report and Mr. Neufeld himself have made it very clear that they found no incidents of fraud, and I put it to the minister that the authorities could certainly have investigated it had they suspected it as there is more than enough information there to investigate if there was a suspicion of fraud, there is no suspicion of fraud. I say again that the electoral crisis in Canada is not that Canadians are voting more than once; it is that they are voting less than once, and we must change this bill.

Will the minister consider amendments?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Minister of State (Democratic Reform)]

Mr. Speaker, the opposition has reacted with predictable hyperbole to the fair elections bill, yet the bill is full of the common-sense measures that are required for the improvement of our democratic system.

To start with, let us deal with the issue of vouching. The opposition has made a controversy over that question, so let us zero in on the issue at stake. Some people have argued that we should not need photo ID to vote. They are right; we should not, and we do not. With the fair elections bill, people will still be able to vote without photo ID in Canada.

In fact, with the passage of the fair elections bill, people will not even need government ID to cast a ballot in this country. People will have the ability to use 39 different forms of identification when they cast their ballot under the fair elections bill, just as is the case right now. So what is the change? A voter will be required to provide some proof of identity and residence; it will no longer suffice for people to simply have a voucher stand in place and assert who they are and where they live.

The risks of vouching are obvious. It is obviously risky to allow someone to vote without having any documented ID of who they are or where they live. They could conceivably vote more than once or in a constituency in which they do not reside.

What is worse than these mere risks is the fact that the safeguards that are meant to mitigate the risks were violated 50,735 times, or 42% of the time, in the last election, according to Elections Canada's own compliance report.

Supporters of vouching have mistakenly believed that they had experienced an “aha” moment recently, when the author of that report, Harry Neufeld, restated his long-standing support for vouching. That was nothing new, of course, nor had anyone ever suggested anything to the contrary. His support for vouching has long been documented. In fact, it was in his report that has been on the public record for a very long time. Anybody could have looked it up. It was not news that he restated that position.

The fact that a long-standing supporter of vouching was the one who actually reported the violations of the rules and its use should be all the more troubling to all of us. Still, some claim that the enormous number of irregularities were simply record-keeping hiccups.

The Neufeld report, regardless of what the author might now claim, said exactly the opposite. Let me quote from page 5:

Errors that involve a failure to properly administer these procedures are serious. The courts refer to such serious errors as “irregularities” which can result in votes being declared invalid.

If members do not like that, they should try page 14:

Too frequently, the errors are so serious that the courts would judge them to be “irregularities” that violate the legal provisions that establish an elector’s entitlement to vote.

Further, Neufeld noted that the sorts of vouching errors that occurred in the riding of Etobicoke Centre “could contribute to a court overturning an election”. That last clause was a quote from page 10.

Rules exist for a reason. They are the “legal safeguards, in place to ensure each elector is actually eligible to vote..”. That is on page 6. Their systematic violation is serious enough for our court to overturn an election result or invalidate a vote, according to the report.

What are these rules, and why does it matter that they were violated? The rule that was most often violated in the last election was the requirement that the local Elections Canada personnel keep records of who vouched and who was vouched for.

By the way, this can be found on page 64 of the final report.

In 45,000 cases there is no such record, so we do not know who was vouched for and we do not know who did the vouching. If we do not know who vouched, then those individuals could violate the rule that they are not supposed to vouch more than once. That is a rule because, if someone systematically vouches for a large number of voters, then that individual can allow voters to cast more than one ballot or cast ballots in constituencies in which they do not reside. That is why the rule exists. The fact that it was violated 45,000-plus times should be a concern to all of us.

We are proposing a very reasonable solution. Individuals could bring basically any document showing who they are and where they live. That document does not have to come from the Government of Canada, the Government of Ontario or any provincial government, or a municipal government. It could come from a utility company. It could come in the form of a student card or an attestation. There are 39 different options. If the opposition wants to focus on a particular category of elector, I am happy to share a form of identification within the existing 39 acceptable examples that would provide those voters with an opportunity to identify who they are and where they live.

Voter turnout is the next issue of debate that the opposition has raised. There are two things that drive people to vote. One is motivation and the other is information. Motivation is what parties and candidates offer to inspire people to vote, giving them something to vote for. Information—the where, when, and how—is the responsibility of Elections Canada.

Election Canada's own data suggests it has done a poor job of providing that information. After the last election, young non-voters reported that not knowing where, when, or how to vote affected their decision not to cast a ballot; 25% did not know where to vote; 26% did not know when; and 19% did not know how to vote. That was one of the factors that led them to make the decision not to cast their ballot.

In the last election, half of our youth in this country did not know that they could vote before election day. Three-quarters of aboriginal youth did not know. If people are busy on election day and are not aware that they can vote early, they miss their chance. That is what led, I think, Elections Canada to write the following in one of its post-election reports, “The most important access barrier was lack of knowledge about the electoral process, including not knowing about different ways to vote...”. The fair elections act would require Elections Canada to communicate this basic information, while the parties do the job of voter motivation.

Finally, the fair elections act would make the law enforcement watchdog, Commissioner Yves Côté, independent from the Chief Electoral Officer. Predictably, the latter does not like that idea. That being said, I think it is completely essential.

First, there are almost three dozen offences in the Canada Elections Act that deal with the conduct of the Chief Electoral Officer's staff. How can the commissioner investigate the CEO's staff when he is one of the CEO's staff himself?

Second, the fair elections act would move the commissioner into the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions. The director has been responsible for laying charges under the Canada Elections Act for the last seven years, and during that time his independence has never been questioned and that is because it is unquestionable. The director is appointed on the recommendation of a committee of non-partisan public servants, a representative of each political party, and a representative of the law societies of the country. The appointment is then validated by an all-party committee of the House of Commons. After being put in that position, the director cannot be removed except through a vote by the House of Commons. In fact, that removal process is similar to what is required for officers of Parliament, including the CEO of Elections Canada and the Auditor General of Canada. No one would argue that those positions lack independence.

Prior to this debate no one has ever argued—and to my knowledge no one in the House of Commons has ever argued—that the Director of Public Prosecutions is not independent. I have never heard Elections Canada argue that the Director of Public Prosecutions is not independent. He has already exercised that independence as the chief prosecutor responsible for the Canada Elections Act for the last seven years. No charges can be laid under that act without his express sign-off and without the prosecution his office carries out subsequently in the courts.

Section 2 of the Director of Public Prosecutions Act specifically excludes the Attorney General, who is an elected politician, from any involvement in prosecutions related to the Canada Elections Act. I have never heard a single example where anyone has even alleged that this provision of the Director of Public Prosecutions Act has been violated. It has been scrupulously and faithfully followed by the DPP, the Attorneys General, and everyone else involved. Not only has there been no finding of wrongdoing in this respect, but I am not aware of even an allegation.

Beyond the independence of the DPP from the government, there is the ongoing independence of the commissioner from the DPP. Allow me to quote directly from clause 108 of the fair elections act. It says:

The Commissioner is to conduct the investigation independently of the Director of Public Prosecutions.

In other words, the prosecutor cannot direct the investigation. That job is exclusively in the hands of the commissioner under the fair elections act. Furthermore, for the first time, the commissioner would have a fixed term, he could not be fired without cause, and he would have control of staffing and investigations. That is real independence.

Canadians instinctively understand that these principles are rooted in both common sense and fairness. That is why they have not joined in the hysteria of the opposition.

The next point of peculiarity in the opposition's critique is related to fundraising. The opposition has come out against the provision in the act that would allow parties to exempt fundraising calls, emails, and letters from campaign expenses. The provision is based on a well-established principle that there is a distinction between raising funds for a campaign and spending those same funds for a campaign.

It is the same reason why people do not put mileage on their car while they are standing and putting gas in it. The mileage only starts to add up when the wheels start turning. The fuel in the car, by itself, does not cause the mileage to grow.

Is this a principle that was invented out of thin air? Actually, it was right in the NDP rule book for its leadership race. Let us look at rule seven, regarding expenses not subject to the party's expense ceiling: 7 d) says, “Any expenses for fundraising...”. Those expenses are explicitly excluded.

In fact, in the NDP rule book, the fundraising exemption is far more vast than what is proposed in the fair elections act. Our bill, by contrast, has clear definitions of what constitutes a fundraising expense. It must be directed at a previous donor of the last five years and it must have the purpose of raising funds, rather than some other purpose.

When the NDP excluded fundraising expenses from its leadership race, it had no such limitations on the exclusion. It was simply the case that anything claimed to be fundraising did not count as part of the party's spending limit. Therefore, for the NDP to now claim that it is opposed to the distinction between fundraising expenses and campaign expenses is a little rich, to put it generously.

We look forward to having continued debate on this bill. I expect there will be a very thorough vetting at the committee, where dozens of witnesses will come and share their points of view. I am prepared, should I be asked to return to the committee, to answer any further questions that the members may have. Although I have not been invited, I put out that offer to the committee.

That being said, this Elections Act reform is fair. It has common sense, and it would ensure that everyday Canadians stay in charge of democracy. It would put special interests on the sidelines. It would put rule breakers out of business. It would close loopholes to big money. It would bring in new penalties for political imposters who use rogue calls to deceive voters.

It would prevent political candidates from using unpaid debts as a way of getting around donation limits, as the Liberals were successful in doing in their leadership race.

These are changes to our electoral system that have been long required. The fair elections act would provide them. That is why I am proud to move the bill and to continue to support it as it travels through the parliamentary process.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr.Speaker, I appreciate the comments by the member, and I want to pick up on some of her comments in regard to the manner in which the legislation is before us today.

It is completely unacceptable that the government has chosen to put Bill C-23 before us in the fashion that it has. There was no legitimate consultation done with Elections Canada. There was no consultation done with opposition parties. There was no consultation done with other stakeholders, and this is one of our fundamental cornerstones of democracy in Canada.

It is fundamentally flawed legislation, and I am wondering if the member would go so far as to agree with what the Globe has said in its editorials, that the bill needs to be stopped in its tracks.

[Alexandrine Latendresse, NDP, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to this motion today.

This motion deals with what is referred to as the new electoral reform bill, which would change many things in our electoral system. Our motion addresses three points in particular: vouching, voter education programming by Elections Canada, and the use of voter cards.

In our opinion, by getting rid of these three extremely important measures the government is harming certain specific groups in particular and I will try to explain why in my speech. Those groups are youth, new Canadians, aboriginal Canadians and seniors living in residences.

Let us begin with vouching. Vouching enables young people who attend school away from home or who are living somewhere where it is very difficult to prove residence to vote by showing identification in the presence of a colleague, a roommate or someone who knows them well and can confirm their identity so that they can vote.

The major advantage to vouching is that the information of both the voter and the voucher is taken down. When people talk about possible or hypothetical fraud in the vouching system, let us not forget that we have all the information from both people who are voting.

Does anyone really believe that someone who is going to cheat the electoral system would provide all their personal information, namely their ID card with a photo, their telephone number and their address? That is absolutely ridiculous. The idea behind vouching is to allow anyone who has difficulty meeting the requirements to exercise their right to vote.

Personally, I was in that situation for quite a while. I am from Montreal and I moved to Rimouski to go to school. I lived there for a number of years without any official proof of address. I lived in residence where electricity was paid for, so I did not have an electricity bill. I had nothing to prove that I lived at that address in Rimouski.

If I could not go to the polling station on election day to vote because I did not have such evidence or documents, I could not exercise my right to vote. That is the reality of the changes to the elections act being proposed today.

My second point has to do with voting using the voter information card, which also specifically affects these groups. As my colleague from Toronto—Danforth just mentioned in response to a question from the government, the 2011 target groups who could use voter information cards to vote were youth, aboriginal people and seniors in residences.

All those in positions of authority who have experience with the electoral system, including the Chief Electoral Officer, Mr. Neufeld and everyone who was involved in the process, have said that this excellent measure helped people to be able to vote. They also recommended that everyone be allowed to use voter information cards.

What did the government decide to do instead? It decided that even the target groups would no longer be allowed to use these cards. These people will be left to their own devices and will have to find a way to vote. The government is telling young people who want to get involved and who want to vote but who face many obstacles to fend for themselves, to make arrangements and to find a way to navigate the new system and vote. However, problems already exist. For example, voter turnout among youth is abysmal.

Mr. Mayrand said something in committee that really stuck with me because I think it clearly identifies the problem. He said:

It is essential to understand that the main challenge for our electoral democracy is not voter fraud, but voter participation.

With regard to the young people who will have difficulty, I would like to quote the motion that I moved in May 2013 before the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs because it is extremely important. It reads:

That the Committee:

(a) Recognize that reports of the Chief Electoral Officer submitted to Parliament from 2010 onward demonstrate that, if Parliament does not modernize our electoral system in order to engage young Canadians, lower and lower percentages of eligible voters will turn out to vote in future federal elections; and

(b) Conduct a comprehensive study before December 2013 on potential mechanisms to enhance youth electoral engagement in Canada, with the view to implement such changes before the next federal election, including: modernizing the online voter registration system; ensuring there are polling stations on university and college campuses across the country; recruiting and training more youth to act as elections officers; raising awareness about how and where to vote, especially among mobile college and university students; considering an electronic voting system; considering automatic registration; and, removing barriers to pre-registering young people at age 16 as prospective voters, in advance of eligibility to vote at age 18.

We thought of such measures because we believed that this issue had to be studied in order to determine how to increase the youth voter turnout rate. Instead of considering these ways to improve youth participation, not only is the government eliminating vouching and voter cards as means of identification, but it is also eliminating all of Elections Canada's voter education programs. Elections Canada will no longer be able to talk to anyone, except to tell voters where, when and how to vote. That is what our dear minister is repeating ad nauseam.

The problem is that encouraging young people to vote is not just about telling them how and where to vote. There are many different things that could be done today to improve the voter turnout of young people. Elections Canada is in the best position to know what to do. It has all the data and the information and the will to improve voter participation. However, it will not have the right to say anything to anyone, other than what it is allowed to say. That really is a problem. I would like to quote the Chief Electoral Officer, who appeared before the committee last week:

I am very preoccupied in this regard with the limitations Bill C-23 imposes on the ability of my office to consult Canadians and disseminate information on electoral democracy, as well as to publish research. I am unaware of any democracy in which such limitations are imposed on the electoral agency and I strongly feel that an amendment in this regard is essential.

The Chief Electoral Officer, Mr. Mayrand, was very clear and said that he was not aware of any democracy that has muzzled its electoral organization like this. This gag order is one of the most harmful things in this bill. Our electoral organization should be independent and able to talk to Canadians about the topics it considers important. If it is not allowed to talk to Canadians, this means it will also not be able to talk about potential cases of fraud, since this will not be one of the very limited number of topics the minister will allow the Chief Electoral Officer to talk about.

We believe that these three things have a negative impact on the participation of groups that are already at a disadvantage in the voting process. Meaningful action could be taken. For example, the Chief Electoral Officer made recommendations to address the potential problems with the voter identification cards and the vouching system. He made some excellent suggestions. For example, he suggested that the government give him the power to hire people earlier and that they be better training. If election staff are better trained and better equipped, there will be far fewer errors of this type that can lead to bigger problems.

The Chief Electoral Officer made a number of suggestions that were not reflected in this bill. That is unacceptable.

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, proposed changes to the Elections Act that would prohibit vouching, voter education programming by Elections Canada, and the use of voter cards as identification could disenfranchise many Canadians, particularly first-time voters like youth and new Canadians, Aboriginal Canadians and seniors living in residence, and should be abandoned.

Mr. Speaker, I will begin by saying that I will be sharing my time with the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent.

Let me begin today's opposition day by stating flat out that our electoral democracy is in serious danger as a consequence of a bill before the House, Bill C-23, the fair elections act, which I think almost everybody who knows anything about the act is now calling the unfair elections act. Conservatives and the Minister of State (Democratic Reform) are, frankly, relying on Canadians' busy lives and complacency about the state of our democracy to ram legislation through the House. They are also hoping for media silence in order to pull off what I would call a kind of Westminster-majority-government coup. Effectively, that is what we are looking at.

Let me also remind everyone of a baseline fact, which is that the right to vote is one of the most fundamental rights in our Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Supreme Court has made clear that statute law needs to be oriented, not only in its enactment but in its interpretation, to enfranchisement, not to the opposite. The right to vote is not even subject to the notwithstanding clause, whereas other important rights, like equality rights, are. This underlines how very foundational and fundamental the right to vote is in our society.

I am going to state flat out a couple of overarching premises about this bill before arguing about the elements we want Conservative MPs, in good faith, to vote with us on today, namely, to get rid of three elements in this bill that are, frankly, atrocities.

Overall, Bill C-23 is a calculated effort and intricate tapestry to do two things. One, for ideological or perhaps for sound philosophical reasons, is to enact a set of principles that are unfair, frankly. Perhaps not from the perspective of the minister and his supporters, but standing alone, without looking at any partisan advantage, this bill is full of unfairness.

Everybody knows, and we would be blind if we did not notice and remiss if we did not mention, that this is also a bill designed to secure strategic partisan advantage for the party that lies behind the government. The two interact. There is no doubt that a lot of my colleagues in the House have bought certain lines and spin from the government and the minister to try to keep this in the philosophical realm and to try to ignore how much of an attempt this is to hijack democracy. I ask them now, and will ask again at the end of my remarks, to please know that Canadians are watching and will notice what they do on this incredibly important bill.

The bill would do four major things, in clusters. There are tons of points I could draw attention to. However, in clusters, this is what the bill does that is so incredibly unfair.

First, it engages in the result, and now, because that result is so clearly known, by intention, of voter suppression. The primary devices for this would be getting rid of the voter identification methods of vouching and the use of voter information cards as authorized by the Chief Electoral Officer.

Second, it is an active attempt to encourage voter apathy and disengagement, with perhaps the single most important factor being getting rid of Elections Canada's public education and outreach mandate in an incredibly brutal way.

Third, it either does not add the necessary tools to enhance the investigative functions and powers of Elections Canada, in particular the Commissioner of Canada Elections, or it actually undermines the investigative power of Elections Canada while simultaneously flipping to a focus away from organized fraud of the sort we are all concerned about, and have been for years, which we all thought was going to be tackled in this bill. It changes the focus from that fraud to a mythical narrative of citizen fraud. Fourth, and finally, it jacks up big money politics in a big way.

I want to come back to the third point, which ties together the questions of voter suppression and the lack of a serious tackling of schemes like the automated robocall scandal from 2011. Effectively before this bill came down, Canadian society and the House had trained a telescope on the government, demanding a bill that would deal adequately and seriously with the above by giving new investigative powers to Elections Canada to deal with the robocall scheme and anything like it. Instead, that telescope has been turned around. The government is looking back at average Canadians and saying that Canadians are the potential source of fraud, and not just them, but also the 200,000 election day workers who try to do their job as best they can every election and yet are now being blamed for a fictional situation of fraud in this country.

The NDP members have been doing what they can and I think Canadians would expect no less. Once they become aware of the bill and what it contained, almost to a person they were deeply concerned about it. They would never forgive us, and we would never forgive ourselves, if we were not taking the fight to the government on the bill in the way we have been doing because, frankly, as I have said before, some foundational elements of our democracy are at stake.

The efforts have been bearing fruit. Civil society stood up to the plate early on and has continued to do so. Too many organizations and individuals have come forward for me to name. I would say a good number in the print media have as well. Regrettably, that has not been the case yet with the national news broadcasters, but I am hoping that they too will soon see their responsibility to keep the bill in front of Canadians' consciousness.

We held eight town halls over the course of the last two weeks. They were full to the bursting point. I want to come back to The Globe and Mail as one of the examples of the print media. It did an unprecedented thing by writing five editorials in a row condemning the bill, taking it apart bit by bit, to the point that the first one said:

The...government's continued focus on the threat of voter fraud in federal elections is approaching absurdity. Everyone with any expertise who has examined the question in detail has arrived at the same conclusion: There is no threat. And yet the government insists that controversial provisions in its proposed Fair Elections Act are needed to eliminate this non-existent terror—even at the risk of disenfranchising thousands of legitimate voters. It makes no sense.

In another editorial, it says simply:

The Fair Elections Act needs a rewrite and a rethink. It isn't good for Canadian democracy.

Today, we see no doubt that The Globe and Mail is aware that the entire day in the House is being devoted to our opposition day motion. In an editorial entitled, “For the Good of the Country: Kill this bill”, the Globe states:

For the government, it is an opportunity to admit error and change course.... This bill deserves to die. The Fair Elections Act must be stopped. Killing it should be Parliament's first order of business.

With that, many of my colleagues will be laying bare the problems with the government's case, the minister's case, which stands on no evidential foundation for getting rid of vouching, getting rid of the use of voter information cards, and gutting public education and outreach.

My task is simply to say that I am speaking to my Conservative colleagues across the aisle. You frankly have been spun by cabinet and the minister. You have a duty to look at this in more detail because, if you do not, you will regret it. You must exert your independence and vote with us today on getting rid of these three elements. If you do not do the right thing, you will be remembered for not standing up for democracy when called for. And if you do not back down, people will remember.

I would end by saying and reminding you that contrary to what the minister has said in his own op-ed today in The Globe and Mail, accusing us and others of hysteria, the fact is that more and more Canadians are engaged, and more and more Canadians are enraged. You should pay attention. If you do not, 2015 will bring a surprise.

Democratic Reform

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Minister of State (Democratic Reform)]

Mr. Speaker, the Chief Electoral Officer will be able to continue speaking to the media after the fair elections act is passed. That is not an issue.

But the NDP wants to ignore the hard facts around the irregularities related to vouching. The reality is, regardless of what push poll they will send out in the next couple of days, Canadians believe there should be a form of identification so that we know who is voting and that they live in the riding in which they are casting a ballot. That is a bare minimum. It is common sense. That is the fair elections act.