Bill C-76 (Historical)

Elections Modernization Act

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

This enactment amends the Canada Elections Act to establish spending limits for third parties and political parties during a defined period before the election period of a general election held on a day fixed under that Act. It also establishes measures to increase transparency regarding the participation of third parties in the electoral process. Among other things that it does in this regard, the enactment
(a) adds reporting requirements for third parties engaging in partisan activities, partisan advertising, and election surveys to the reporting requirements for third parties engaging in election advertising;
(b) creates an obligation for third parties to open a separate bank account for expenses related to the matters referred to in paragraph (a); and
(c) creates an obligation for political parties and third parties to identify themselves in partisan advertising during the defined period before the election period.
The enactment also amends the Act to implement measures to reduce barriers to participation and increase accessibility. Among other things that it does in this regard, the enactment
(a) establishes a Register of Future Electors in which Canadian citizens 14 to 17 years of age may consent to be included;
(b) broadens the application of accommodation measures to all persons with a disability, irrespective of its nature;
(c) creates a financial incentive for registered parties and candidates to take steps to accommodate persons with a disability during an election period;
(d) amends some of the rules regarding the treatment of candidates’ expenses, including the rules related to childcare expenses, expenses related to the care of a person with a disability and litigation expenses;
(e) amends the rules regarding the treatment of nomination contestants’ and leadership contestants’ litigation expenses and personal expenses;
(f) allows Canadian Forces electors access to several methods of voting, while also adopting measures to ensure the integrity of the vote;
(g) removes limitations on public education and information activities conducted by the Chief Electoral Officer;
(h) removes two limitations on voting by non-resident electors: the requirement that they have been residing outside Canada for less than five consecutive years and the requirement that they intend to return to Canada to resume residence in the future; and
(i) extends voting hours on advance polling days.
The enactment also amends the Act to modernize voting services, facilitate enforcement and improve various aspects of the administration of elections and of political financing. Among other things that it does in this regard, the enactment
(a) removes the assignment of specific responsibilities set out in the Act to specific election officers by creating a generic category of election officer to whom all those responsibilities may be assigned;
(b) limits election periods to a maximum of 50 days;
(c) removes administrative barriers in order to facilitate the hiring of election officers;
(d) authorizes the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to provide the Chief Electoral Officer with information about permanent residents and foreign nationals for the purpose of updating the Register of Electors;
(e) removes the prohibition on the Chief Electoral Officer authorizing the notice of confirmation of registration (commonly known as a “voter information card”) as identification;
(f) replaces, in the context of voter identification, the option of attestation for residence with an option of vouching for identity and residence;
(g) removes the requirement for electors’ signatures during advance polls, changes procedures for the closing of advance polls and allows for counting ballots from advance polls one hour before the regular polls close;
(h) replaces the right or obligation to take an oath with a right or obligation to make a solemn declaration, and streamlines the various declarations that electors may have the right or obligation to make under specific circumstances;
(i) relocates the Commissioner of Canada Elections to within the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer, and provides that the Commissioner is to be appointed by the Chief Electoral Officer, after consultation with the Director of Public Prosecutions, for a non-renewable term of 10 years;
(j) provides the Commissioner of Canada Elections with the authority to impose administrative monetary penalties for contraventions of provisions of Parts 16, 17 and 18 of the Act and certain other provisions of the Act;
(k) provides the Commissioner of Canada Elections with the authority to lay charges;
(l) provides the Commissioner of Canada Elections with the power to apply for a court order requiring testimony or a written return;
(m) clarifies offences relating to
(i) the publishing of false statements,
(ii) participation by non-Canadians in elections, including inducing electors to vote or refrain from voting, and
(iii) impersonation; and
(n) implements a number of measures to harmonize and streamline political financing monitoring and reporting.
The enactment also amends the Act to provide for certain requirements with regard to the protection of personal information for registered parties, eligible parties and political parties that are applying to become registered parties, including the obligation for the party to adopt a policy for the protection of personal information and to publish it on its Internet site.
The enactment also amends the Parliament of Canada Act to prevent the calling of a by-election when a vacancy in the House of Commons occurs within nine months before the day fixed for a general election under the Canada Elections Act.
It also amends the Public Service Employment Act to clarify that the maximum period of employment of casual workers in the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer — 165 working days in one calendar year — applies to those who are appointed by the Commissioner of Canada Elections.
Finally, the enactment contains transitional provisions, makes consequential amendments to other Acts and repeals the Special Voting Rules.

[Ryan O'Connor]

That's subject to my reviewing them in great detail, but Mr. Kent has provided a summary, so I'll make some brief remarks about that.

Certainly, we will comply with whatever legislation applies at a given time. If PIPEDA is extended to include third parties operating on a national level—I suppose Parliament can amend the legislation to do that—we'll comply.

However, the problem we would have would be increasing compliance costs. Already with Bill C-76, there are going to be significant compliance costs for third parties between elections. They will have to monitor their online advocacy if they receive a number of funds that total $10,000 or more. That's not a lot of money when they're receiving those donations within the four-year election cycle. Groups that don't even consider themselves third party political advertisers now might fall within the ambit of Bill C-76. That means they'll have to hire an auditor. That costs money. That means they'll have to potentially hire legal counsel for many different things that they wouldn't have had to before. That costs money.

If the intent is to have a robust political discourse in this country, managed by Elections Canada, I don't know that an increase in clients' costs, especially for small third parties, would do it. Certainly, our organization and our sister organizations will comply with the legislation as it's drafted. Provincial privacy legislation already applies to the work that we do. But again, if PIPEDA is extended, it should be extended fairly and to all political actors, including all political parties and candidates. Some of the biggest repositories of personal information in this country rest in all of the political parties' databases, not in third party databases.

[Ryan O'Connor]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Canadians and this committee are rightly concerned about foreign involvement in our domestic electoral process in light of both the Cambridge Analytica affair and the prominent interference by foreign actors in the last American presidential election.

Canada has unfortunately not been immune to such interference. Foreign-funded groups have publicly admitted to engaging in third party campaigns against certain parliamentarians in the last federal election, and many third party political advocacy groups openly and overtly accept contributions from foreign entities.

I'm going to focus my remarks on two main areas of concern. First, parliamentarians must avoid the unnecessary regulation of online political speech, which will undermine Canadians' right to freedom of expression. Second, any legislative reforms regarding the protection and safeguarding of personal data should be undertaken through amending the currently constituted privacy legislation, as opposed to creating new and potentially onerous legal requirements for advocacy groups.

Bill C-76, the elections modernization act, recently passed third reading in the Senate, as we're aware, and presumably will get royal assent shortly. This legislation contains sweeping new regulations of third party political advertising and foreign involvement in the Canadian political discourse.

Some changes in this legislation are welcome, but do not go far enough: namely, that foreign entities are now restricted from funding third parties, and foreign third parties are restricted from advertising during election campaigns. However, foreign entities can still fund third party pre-election issue advocacy campaigns and can still participate as foreign third parties outside of an election period.

One of the most significant ways in which this committee can address the issue of foreign interference in Canadian political campaigns is to recommend that Parliament further restrict the involvement of foreign third parties and foreign-funded domestic third parties in the political process.

However, some changes in that legislation have gone too far. Bill C-76, as passed, for the first time imposes spending restrictions and financial disclosure requirements on third party ads and partisan activities, such as canvassing and calling, from a pre-election period starting June 30 before a fixed-date election until the writ drops. Moreover, Elections Canada will now be regulating, between elections, third parties that spend or receive donations in the amount of $10,000 or more in relation to ads or partisan activity, and they'll be required to provide this disclosure to Elections Canada.

The Court of Appeal for British Columbia recently found, in 2012, that regulating third party political speech outside of the writ period unjustifiably violates the charter guarantee of free expression, and it is these aspects of Bill C-76 that will, in our view, also be found to be unconstitutional.

There has been some public discussion that this committee should concern itself with policing what some call misinformation found on social media. Respectfully, this committee should decline the opportunity to do so. Leaving aside the obvious constitutional concerns of the state regulating the content of political speech for truthfulness or to sanction offenders, what misinformation is or is not is in the eye of the beholder. Criticizing political speech as misinformation is often code for simple disagreement with a political opinion. There is no easy means for the government or its agencies such as Elections Canada to determine when political opinion enters the realm of what it perceives to be misinformation, and Canadians should be trusted to make their own decisions about the viability and validity of information they find online.

Parliament should not compound the constitutional folly of its over-regulation of third party political speech by attempting to prescribe the content of third party political advertising and issue group advertising. Over-regulating third party political advocacy may have the unintended consequence of chilling political speech. Bill C-76, as it was passed, will significantly increase compliance costs for advocacy groups in the country, many of which are not-for-profit and at one point or another during the election cycle engage in political advocacy. These include everything from small environmental groups to indigenous organizations to taxpayer watchdogs and large trade unions.

Additional regulations concerning advocacy groups' online political activity may simply cause some groups to refrain from participating in commentary on government policy or participating in political debate or, worse yet, to simply ignore or flout the law. Again, this is especially problematic for smaller organizations that will now have to monitor their between-elections advocacy to ensure compliance with the requirements of Bill C-76. More time spent on compliance is less time engaging in campaign and debate, and our public discourse will be the poorer for it. This committee should refrain from any recommendations that over-burden advocacy groups.

Canada has a robust legal infrastructure for the protection of personal information through PIPEDA, through provincial legislation and through administrative structures such as the Office of the Privacy Commissioner. Third party groups are generally required to abide by applicable privacy legislation and, in our view, it is unnecessary to create a new legal regime when the present legislation suffices.

Our organization has been vigilant about protecting the data of Canadians who support and follow Ontario Proud's web properties. It has a long-standing privacy policy, and the personal data of supporters is kept confidential. Any time messages or emails are sent to supporters online, which supporters have already consented to receive, an opt-out or unsubscribe option is always clearly provided.

The first recommendation found in this committee's report of June 2018 is of interest to online advocacy groups, namely that this committee recommended that the government enact transparency requirements regarding how political actors collect and use data to target advertising, including identifying the source of the ad and the target audience. It's notable, however, that the Facebook ads function already contains much of the information that the committee suggests should be legally compelled.

We do not object to transparency requirements, provided they're enacted in such a way as to minimize or eliminate compliance costs for third party advocacy groups. For example, there should be no additional reporting requirements to a government agency, and any such regulations should be applied universally to all political parties, candidates, third parties and advocacy groups, and enacted within the presently existing legislative regime.

The review that this committee is undertaking is both timely and valuable. However, a single data breach involving a single online platform should not be used as an opportunity to over-regulate online political speech or to legislate third party electoral advertising out of existence. In its haste to address the very valid concerns about data security and privacy that arose from the Cambridge Analytica affair, this committee should take great care to ensure that it doesn't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Canada is a country that values free expression, which fundamentally protects citizens' political speech and, by extension, that of third parties and their supporters. The former Chief Justice McLachlin and Justice Major wrote in minority reasons in Harper v. Canada, the Supreme Court's 2004 decision on third party advertising limits, as follows:

This Court has repeatedly held that liberal democracy demands the free expression of political opinion, and affirmed that political speech lies at the core of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms’ guarantee of free expression. It has held that the freedom of expression includes the right to attempt to persuade through peaceful interchange. And it has observed that the electoral process is the primary means by which the average citizen participates in the public discourse that shapes our polity.

Just as much as parliamentarians have a responsibility to protect Canadians' privacy and personal information, so, too, do parliamentarians have a responsibility to uphold this constitutional guarantee of free expression. Protecting the former cannot and should not entail undermining the latter, and the protection of personal privacy should never be used as a proxy for the prevention of political speech.

Thank you.

Ethics

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think the member likes being reminded that when it comes to the RCMP, the RCMP works independently of the government.

The member started off with Bill C-76. We look forward to seeing Bill C-76 pass so that we can strengthen the rules for elections.

We want to see more Canadians working. That is what the New Democrats used to say, but something happens to them when they are in the House where they forget that we are here to serve Canadians. More Canadians working and voting is better for democracy, and we will continue to strengthen our democratic institutions.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, with Bill C-76, Liberals quietly doubled the threshold at which ridings are audited. In a news report out today, we learned that then-Liberal MP for Brampton East raised over $600,000 at one single event. That is curious, because that is six times the legal amount to run an election in Brampton East.

From the beginning, the only prime minister ever convicted of breaking ethics laws has claimed he knows nothing of the RCMP or ethics investigations into this MP. Is that because he sees nothing troubling with an MP being tailed by the cops or is it because the money was just too good?

Democratic Reform

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, as my hon. colleague knows, we absolutely do not support foreign interference in our elections at all. This is something on which all colleagues in the House should get together to ensure we are not politicizing this issue.

In fact, Bill C-76 has important measures in place to ensure that we are not enabling foreign funding in any event in advertising for our elections and that we are protecting the integrity of our elections. This is something that is above partisanship and we are working hard with all our national security agencies to ensure that—

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, we are committed to protecting and defending Canadians' democratic institutions. That is rich coming from the party opposite. It is the party that has been found guilty of trying to influence elections in three past campaigns, the party of in and out, the party of robocalls, the party of Dean Del Mastro.

We are protecting and strengthening our democratic institutions. Bill C-76 would do that.

[Bernadette Jordan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, we take foreign interference in democratic processes with the utmost seriousness and we will continue to work to protect our institutions and our elections.

With Bill C-76, we are putting forward the necessary measures to protect against foreign interference in our elections. Measures to ban foreign funding as well as to provide greater transparency in elections-related advertising by third parties and on digital platforms are key changes that will help close loopholes for foreign actors that have used other jurisdictions around the world.

Let me be clear. We will not tolerate foreign interference and will respond with the full weight of the law.

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, we have put forward Bill C-76, which will enable more Canadians to vote.

We are ensuring that Canadians who need help voting will have that access to voting. With Bill C-76 we are putting in place safeguards to protect our elections from foreign interference. We are putting forward the independent debates commissioner to make sure that all Canadians have access to watching their federal leaders debate, something that did not happen under the previous government because one political party decided not to participate.

We are absolutely committed to ensuring that all Canadians are taking part in our elections, and—

[Stephanie Kusie]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I, too, am in support of this motion. I think there are just too many unanswered questions in terms of how this commission and the position of the debates commissioner came to be, which I believe we outlined to some extent this morning when the minister was here. I certainly brought some of those to light, and they included the lack of transparency regarding the process to determine the appointment of the commissioner.

I think we all felt very strongly that Mr. Johnston is indeed a very strong candidate, certainly not only given his professional background and his background as an official of the state. I think we'd be hard pressed as Conservatives to find any fault with his experience and his background, as well as the fact that he was appointed by our previous leader and Prime Minister.

It was more in regard to how we feel as though we were...and you know, we're not alone in this feeling. It's also been indicated by our colleagues from other parties that we were not provided the opportunity to submit names. I did not submit a name. In fact, I didn't even get any consideration because I wasn't asked to give it consideration. In addition to that, we did not receive a short list to do a comparative analysis and decide if one candidate might have qualities over another that might serve the Canadian public well in the role of debates commissioner.

This role does require a special individual with special talents. It's very important that we take the time to evaluate those, in this case even in a comparative analysis, as I said, but we weren't provided with that opportunity to do such an analysis—not at all. In fact, it was a morning, not a cold morning like this morning, but a morning, where I received a phone call from the minister. I was looking out over Ottawa and thinking, “What a great day.” She had news that Mr. Johnston had been chosen as the candidate.

Again, I was pleasantly surprised to hear that it was Mr. Johnston. As I indicated, we have no qualms, to use a popular phrase, in regard to Mr. Johnston. It is, again, the way it was determined that is a concern. In fact, we don't even know how it was determined. We will never know the other candidates the government considered. We'll probably never know the other names that ended up deleted, refused or sent back. Those will always be a mystery to us most probably, having been left with this one single candidate.

Moving on, I was very relieved to see the minister express regret that there was no further exploration of other people in other capacities in an attempt to do this.

The second point I brought up to the minister was that this appointment was not brought through the House of Commons, which would have allowed adequate debate and a vote. We here in the opposition are no strangers to having debate shut down, I'll tell you that. Many of my days, many of my mornings, to talk about mornings again, have been absolutely ruined by time allocations. The list of things I had planned and the things I was going to accomplish just all never came to pass because of time-allocation votes.

Here's yet another situation where a fulsome debate in the House has not been allowed. Never mind a vote, even debate, but a vote as well, because isn't that really why we are all here, to vote and to express the will of our constituents, and of Canadians?

That is certainly something the minister talked a lot about this morning, doing this for Canadians. Are we really expressing the will of Canadians if we, as their representatives, did not have the opportunity to vote on their behalf, not even on a list of candidates but a candidate? This did not happen.

On debate, my goodness, there was just so much to debate here in regard to the process: the composition of the commission, the number of debates, the language format of the debates, and the information regarding the broadcasting. I think we could have spent literally hundreds of hours on debate, or certainly dozens of hours on debate. This is something that truly affects Canadians so directly and so consequentially.

As I have stated from the beginning, the debate format is how Canadians get to know the individual who will be the leader of their nation. This is a very integral part of that. Certainly they'll read articles online, they may catch clips on TV, and all leaders during the election will be out and about, pressing their platforms in all parts of the nation, attempting to meet people and to sell their ideas. But this debate format is integral to allowing Canadians to make decisions. What could be more important than that?

The fact that we were not able to debate that within the House and bring it to a vote is just incredibly unfortunate, and really, in my humble opinion, can't be called democratic.

We talked about this term “independent commission”. Now, independent commission itself is not a paradox, but if I were to say, “government” independent commission, that is a paradox right there. They're two words that just don't belong beside each other. “Independent government” commission, I guess I should invert those two words so it's actually probably more appropriate in terms of how we might express it.

As I indicated this morning, how can this possibly be independent when, in fact, it is funded by the Liberal government?

The minister did make me think a bit when she said we could say that about all entities. Yes, I guess we could, but yesterday, for example, when we had the fall economic statement, it's clearly defined as the government's fall economic statement. It wasn't the independent fall economic statement. It was the federal government's fall economic statement, yet this is claiming to be independent. The two are actually very different.

As I said, it was created by the Liberal government. Those are my favourite games where I get to make up the rules. I really like those games a lot. It was created by the Liberal government, and the criteria, which we've seen, which my colleague Mr. Reid has shown, is in fact conflictual. It's conflictual within its own context and within its presentation, as we are finding out in the differences between the order in council and what is on the website. We can't even determine with certainty what they intend the criteria to be, much less what the interpretation of the criteria is. We're at a loss in both those senses, which really begs the necessity for this further review, without question.

Especially this third one to determine success in the next election. My goodness, what do we use? A magic eight ball, a crystal ball, who knows? What data predicts the...? I guess we can look to past data in an effort to predict the future, but it's never really perfect, is it? I think in fact we've seen that with polls more and more in recent history, as we have seen some surprising outcomes from elections. As I was indicating, the criteria are not clear.

I was very disturbed to hear that one of the advisory positions, as I understand it, goes to a PCO member. If that doesn't scream “not independent”, I really don't know what does. Maybe if the Prime Minister were to sit, is that independent? Probably not. It's sort of getting there, though, if someone from the PCO is a member of this advisory commission without question.

I indicated to the minister that many of the leading industry participants, top journalists.... I mentioned Chantal Hébert, Marie Vastel and Andrew Coyne. I really like Andrew Coyne. He's always right on the money. There is Chris Selley and Colby Cosh. I feel like I grew up with that guy. When I read his column, it seems we've always been in the same place at the same time.

My point is that all of these top journalists are coming out against this idea of this debate commission, and that is an indicator of the necessity for this study. Really, yes, this is supposed to be for Canadians, as the minister indicated. However, who better to guide us in terms of the information Canadians want to have and need to know—a term we hear a lot in our society—in an effort to make their decision, possibly one of the most important decisions they can make?

All of these top journalists and all of these top people in their field have, in fact, come out against this idea. It really warrants review when those who have historically played this role are saying this is a bad idea. That should be like a flashing red light, and certainly an amber light—if nothing else—to be like, “Whoa, slow down. Let's re-evaluate this. Let's see what we're doing here, really.” Those things are all very important to consider.

Unfortunately, this debate commissioner comes at a time when we are questioning democracy in terms of some of the actions we have seen within this government. Many of the ideas in Bill C-76 have been discussed at length and ad nauseam, including our perspective on spending limits, something very concerning. There is also the fact that five third parties could outspend a registered party. That's very concerning.

We've seen a lot of concern in regard to the voter cards, and making sure there is legitimacy of the electorate. That's very important. The non-residential requirements are very concerning.

With regard to foreign interference, we were told in this bill that this is bad or don't do that. However, were the mechanisms legislated to specifically prohibit this from ever happening? No, they were not. Therefore, they are still in play. Then, of course, there is the aspect of foreign influence, which the bill did not touch at all. As time goes on, I am seeing this more and more also as a defence issue, and not just as a democratic institutions issue. It certainly has an effect on our democratic institutions when this type of activity occurs, so we need to be ready for it.

I was just in Silicon Valley over the weekend. I had the incredible opportunity to watch a panel with the vice-president of communications at Facebook, Mr. Elliot Schrage. He, in fact, was dealing with a serious external breach the day before. It just takes an example like that to show you how effectual this type of activity can be. It's one of those things you think is never going to happen, and then, lo and behold, it happens. We can't just hide our heads in the sand and pretend this isn't going to occur. We have to take real measures to absolutely make sure this doesn't come to pass.

I was really lucky. I had a real education in Silicon Valley in regard to these types of security breaches, which could be part of our review as we go on to evaluate the possibility of a review. I'm going to go over just a few of them, which I thought were so fascinating: Saudi Aramco, the product of the Iranian government; DarkSeoul, out of North Korea; Sands Casino, again out of Iran. This one was really interesting: Sony Pictures, again by North Korea, on November 24, 2014. My goodness, the possibility for evil-doing is just infinite. They gave us the example—although certainly it's not an election example—that any foreign actor could hack into, say, a military database and change all the blood types. That would really throw our defence forces for a loop, heaven forbid, if something should happen.

My point, again, is that these are things that were perhaps not evaluated effectively within Bill C-76, despite all of our amendments and our forced-into amendments. It really is incredible how quickly something like that could happen.

We had that there. When we evaluate Bill C-76, in addition to this debates commission, it unfortunately makes us really start to question the objectives of this government and these actions. “We the people”—we've heard that throughout time. “For the people”—that's something we've heard a lot more lately. What do people really think when they hear “we the people” or “for the people”? Even “for the people”—how did people think about that phrase a year ago compared to now? I argue that it has a really different context now from a year ago.

My point is that a government can say it's really doing this for Canadians, but the only way to truly know that is to evaluate the action and then make the determination whether that is truly what is happening. If we evaluate policies and proposals and actions, and we see that they're not actually serving the people but are serving the entity—in this case the government itself—then, unfortunately, it's hard for us to have confidence. That's all the more reason for having this review.

I'm sure the government would welcome the opportunity to have these tests of democracy checked and challenged because, if they truly felt confident in their capacity as democratic instruments, then they would not hesitate at all in an effort to have them put to each of their own individual tests.

I dare say, some of the stuff you read in the media in terms of the accusations that fly around in regard to third parties is very rich. In fact, we, the Conservatives, put forward amendments that would have eliminated the possibility of many of these problems. They were rejected time after time after time. In fact, it was 194 times, to be precise. One hundred and ninety-four—that's a pretty big number, I have to say.

We have Bill C-76, and then we have this debate commission, with the uncertain processes for candidates, not having gone through the House—again—trying hard to prove its independence, and questioning the journalists who have come forth opposing it. Then yesterday, lo and behold, what do we see again in the fall economic statement but this announcement of $595 million for the media.

This is really crazy stuff, seeing this type of money put towards what is supposed to be an independent media. Actually, now that I evaluate that, I really don't know what $595 million gets you in terms of production value. With Facebook, you could—

[Charles Robert]

We could probably compile that. I don't think that would be too difficult.

A kind of solution that might be helpful is if the communications presented a chronology of the legislation—if they said, as of whatever date their communication has been released, that “Bill C-76 is at second reading in the House of Commons”, or “is before a committee”. If you are required to put in some kind of chronological context then you would be absolutely sure that the bill hasn't yet passed. That might be a helpful way to anchor the communiqué that the departments or agencies may wish to convey with a clear understanding that, yes, it's still before Parliament, nothing has happened, nothing is finalized, and the members have full scope to review the bill, change it, reject it, whatever they might decide to do.

[Stephanie Kusie]

Of course, policies are usually meant to cover general matters, but I believe there are times when specific issues get addressed. One example is that the directive on the management of communications has specific rules on pre-election communications. In fact, Treasury Board ministers amended that specific element just last month after Conservatives insisted that the government had made the playing field far too uneven with its Bill C-76 proposals.

Back to the specific study, is there any guidance in any of the federal government's communication policies concerning communications about parliamentary business?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, NL]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you to both of you.

Ms. Baird, in your speech, the key words you have are “timely, clear, objective, factual and non-partisan”. Can we just focus on the word “timely” for a moment? I understand the mistake of this, implying that a legislation has passed when it has not, but I do believe that all government departments must exercise due diligence to anticipate this type of thing.

I compared this situation of Bill C-71 with Bill C-76, which is about the election. Of course, Elections Canada has to get its act together, as it were, before legislation is even passed. Otherwise, it would not work. The coming into force is taken seriously, and so on and so forth.

I understand how some departments can rush ahead with something that was not given sober second thought, if I could steal that term from the other chamber, but in this particular case, you talk about your communications both outward and inward. Although the mistake was the result of something that happened in Public Safety that was an outward mistake, it's the inward mechanisms by which it could have been solved.

This doesn't pertain to your department, but how do you take responsibility for this, and how do you fix it as an inward communication exercise among the other departments?

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Last, you mentioned the short time period between now and the next election. Bill C-76 requires political parties to have privacy policies. Should the Office of the Privacy Commissioner have oversight of those privacy policies?

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

You talked about minimum standards in regulating political activities. I'll just throw out some minimum standards, and you can answer with yes or no.

Would you support real-time ad disclosure, including engagement metrics, the number of ad dollars spent, and the source of those ad dollars?

Bill C-76 goes part of the way, but this would go a little bit further.

[Stéphane Perrault]

I won't speak to the specifics of that case. I understand that your question was not about that. As we all know, money is hard to track and limit. Things can be done. The current rules under the act have a number of weaknesses. A number of recommendations have been made in the past, and they're part of Bill C-76.

Bill C-76 goes beyond that. Two main weaknesses are being addressed. The first is that in the past, contributions were made six months prior to the writ period. Because of the way the law is drafted, they were treated as belonging to the entity, so it's their own resources, even though they may come from abroad. The second weakness is that the current law regulates election advertising, which is a narrow category of expenditures. We've seen an expansion of the activities in recent years.

On both fronts, Bill C-76 improves that by expanding it to all partisan activities and requiring a reporting of all contributions. It also has a number of additional measures. One of them I recommended at committee, which is having an anti-avoidance clause precisely to deal with the kind of situation where money is being passed from one entity to another and claims are made Canadian in the process.

The rules are there. They may be difficult to track and enforce, and we'll be working with the commissioner and inviting people who see these things to report these matters to the commissioner so that investigations can take place.