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.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Thank you very much.

I thank all three of you for being here today. We are working very hard on this study, and you have provided us with very relevant information for our work.

Mr. Pal, you mentioned that there were measures in Bill C-76 to prevent foreign or national interference in the elections. What effect could those changes have on third parties? That is one of my concerns.

During the recent election in Ontario, we saw Ottawa Proud, for instance, promote the information of a particular party, and not that of other parties. Do you think that an organization like that one could be affected by a foreign third party or by a government that has a lot of data in its possession?

How can we limit sharing large amounts of data with countries that have fewer regulations, even if financial exchanges are not necessarily involved?

Mr. Pal, I will let you begin, and the other two witnesses may speak afterwards.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

Right, but procedurally we can still dig our way out.

The amendment was that the committee not commence clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-76 on Tuesday, October 2, 2018, at 11 a.m.

The first motion would have been nonsensical and therefore would have been made moot by the passage of time. Given the fact that we're talking about not doing something at a point in the past, I think it still would be in order if that amendment were actually to pass.

Finally, there was my own amendment to the amendment. This was before the committee had heard from the Ontario chief electoral officer “nor until the committee has heard from the Minister for Democratic Institutions for not less than one hour”.

I'll just stop there.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

I would amend it so it is just more logical, so that the committee would commence clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-76 on Thursday, October 4, at 11 a.m.

The rest of the motion would remain the same.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON]

The wording of the initial motion was:

That the Committee commence clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-76 on Tuesday, October 2, 2018 at 11:00 a.m.;

This, of course, is now a point that is in the past.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

We'll assume this is the deadline for submitting amendments, but people can always bring them to the floor.

We were debating the scheduling of Bill C-76, and subamendments and amendments.

Mr. Reid.

[Prof. Michael Pal]

Regulating fake news is the hardest issue. My fake news might not be your fake news. Voter suppression's already illegal. Foreign interference is already illegal, and C-76 takes some really good steps toward closing the final loopholes that are there. C-76 would put in place an offence of impersonating a politician or a political party, so that you couldn't purport that the advertisement came from a particular elected representative or party.

In the Canada Elections Act it's already illegal, if you're a candidate, to claim the person you're running against is going to drop out of the race for some reason. That was a common tactic that was used, so we legislated against it. In C-76, voter suppression and robocalls are all things where we've updated the legislation to deal with whatever the new dirty tricks are, potentially. I don't see any problem in saying, “Today, a lot of the dirty tricks are potentially happening on social media. Which entities have the resources and the ability to actually ensure that the rules are followed?”

It's impossible to try to track down every purveyor of misinformation, disinformation and voter suppression. It's much easier to regulate the social media platforms. It's technologically feasible. They're telling us they're changing the world. They should be able to have a transparency and a repository of election ads without too much of a hit to their bottom lines, and I think we can do that in a way that respects freedom of political expression. One of the things we've learned over the last 18 months is that regulating social media platforms is actually what has to happen now.

[Greg Essensa]

I will be recommending to Ontario's legislators that we provide greater transparency into where the money comes from third parties and that there be a requirement for third parties to differentiate where funds are actually coming from in their financial reporting requirements and materials that they need to provide to us at Elections Ontario.

I would suggest this is something your committee may wish to consider while you're deliberating Bill C-76, to provide those mechanisms for the commissioner of Canada elections to, in fact, investigate where some of those funds are, requiring third parties to provide information on a fulsome basis as to the derivative of exactly where that money has come from and whose money is being used during the campaigns. I think there are—

[Greg Essensa]

I think it's critical. You have to go no further than to read many of the publications on issues of Facebook and other social media issues that have been raised in the last several months.

I think it is incumbent on political parties and all political actors to ensure the personal privacy of those individuals whose information they've been given.

I am supportive of our regime in Ontario. It requires political parties to effectively swear to me that they've destroyed that information, and it's no longer in their domain.

I think that Bill C-76 should consider revisions or amendments to strengthen the privacy requirements. I think all Canadians would expect that.

[Greg Essensa]

My recommendation to you, as you're reviewing Bill C-76, would be to consider either increasing the threshold so that it is relatively easy for the commissioner of Canada elections to ascertain whether they met that threshold or not.

[Professor Michael Pal, Associate Professor, Faculty of Law, Common Law Section, University of Ottawa, As an Individual]

Thank you very much for having me today.

I'm an associate professor in the faculty of law at the University of Ottawa, where I teach election law and constitutional law. Also, I am the director of the public law group there, although today I speak only for myself. I work on matters including voter privacy, campaign finance laws applied online and social media platform regulation, in addition to election cybersecurity. Today I'd like to speak to you a little bit about political parties, which I know is something you've heard a lot about, about social media platform regulation, and then about cybersecurity, briefly, I think, given what you've heard in the last few rounds of testimony.

Some of this material I had the opportunity to present to your colleagues in the procedure and House affairs committee in their study of Bill C-76, so I also have a few comments about that bill.

The first issue, which I know you've heard about, is voter privacy as it relates to political parties. As my colleague Professor Dubois mentioned, political parties are one of the few major important Canadian institutions and entities not covered by meaningful privacy regulation. They are not government entities under the Privacy Act, and they are not engaging in commercial activity under PIPEDA. They fall into a gap between the two major pieces of federal privacy legislation.

Very recently, all of the privacy commissioners across Canada—the federal commissioner and the provincial ones—issued a statement saying this was an unsatisfactory state of affairs and something needed to be done about it. Only in B.C. are political parties covered by provincial privacy laws. There was a bill in Quebec, as I know you've heard, which was not passed before the recent election.

Bill C-76 would address these measures to some extent. Mainly, though, it would require political parties to have privacy policies and set rules on which particular issues the policies must address. All the major registered parties already do have privacy policies. The bill might change some of the issues that they address, because they're not consistent across all parties, but it would not actually clearly give oversight authority to either the federal Privacy Commissioner or Elections Canada. It would not actually require specific content in privacy policies. It wouldn't provide an enforcement mechanism. Therefore, I think, it's a good first step. It's the biggest step that's been made in terms of political parties and privacy, but it doesn't go far enough.

What would regulation of political parties to protect voter privacy look like? Voters should have the right to know what data political parties hold about them. Voters should have the right to correct incorrect information, which is pretty common under other privacy regimes. Voters should have comfort that political parties should only use the data they collect for actual legitimate political purposes. As Professor Dubois mentioned, it's a good thing that political parties collect information about voters—you can find out what voters actually want and you can learn more about them—but that data should only be used for political purposes, electoral purposes.

One place where I think some of the other generally applicable privacy rules would not work here is, say, on a “do not call” list. Political parties should be able to contact voters, and it would be a problem, I think, for democratic electoral integrity if 25%, 30% or 40% of voters were simply uncontactable by political parties. I think we have to actually adapt the content of the rules that are out there for the specific context of political parties and elections.

The second big issue I wanted to address is social media platform regulations. I know you've heard a lot about Facebook. A lot of this is contained in a paper I gave recently at MIT, which I'm happy to share with the committee if it's useful. The Canada Elections Act and related legislation governs political parties, leadership candidates, nomination contestants and third parties, as you well know. Social media platforms and technology companies need to be included under the set of groups that are explicitly regulated by electoral legislation and the legislation that is under the purview of this committee. How so? Platforms should be required to disclose and maintain records about the source of any entities seeking to advertise on them.

Bill C-76 does take some positive measures there. It would prevent, say, Facebook from accepting a foreign political advertisement for the purpose of influencing a Canadian election. That's a good step forward. It only applies during the election campaign, as I read it, and I would like to see a more robust rule that requires due diligence on the part of the social media companies. Is there a real person here? Where are they located? Are they trying to pay in rubles or dollars? Do they have an address and other basic things that we would all pretty logically think of doing, if you cared about the source of the donation.

That relates to foreign interference. It also relates to having a clean domestic campaign finance system, given all the advertising that happens online.

Another issue that I think requires further regulation is search terms. You can microtarget ads to particular users of a social media platform. If there's a political election ad on Hockey Night in Canada, we get to see the content of the ad. As members of the public, we don't necessarily get to see an ad that's microtargeted at an individual or a group of individuals and those individuals might not even know why they were targeted.

There are certain kinds of searches that we may think have no place in electoral policy. For instance, searching for racists is something you can do, potentially, and there's been a lot of media discussion about that and whether that did happen in the last U.S. election. I don't think we have concrete information about particular instances, but we know enough to know that search terms might be used in a way that we find objectionable, in broadly understood terms about how democracy should operate in Canada.

Therefore, there's a public value in disclosing search terms, but also to the individuals that have been targeted who may not know why.

Another issue is that there should be a public repository of all election-related ads. Facebook has voluntarily done some of this. That decision could be rescinded at any point by people sitting in California. That's not an acceptable state of affairs to me, so that should be legally mandated.

A very interesting precedent has been raised about political communication on WhatsApp. There's even less publicity about what is sent on text messaging, especially for encrypted end-to-end applications, like WhatsApp. It came out in the media recently that, in the Ontario provincial election, there were political communications on XBox. I don't use the XBox. I don't play a lot of video games, but people who do can be targeted and have election ads directed to them. In the public, we have no way of knowing what the content of those ads are, so public disclosure of election ads on an ongoing basis, not just during the election campaign, on all the relevant platforms is something that I would like to see.

Another matter is social media platforms and whether they should be treated as broadcasters. I'm not an expert in telecommunications law. I don't make any claims about whether, say, Facebook should count as a broadcaster, like CTV or CBC, generally. However, there are provisions in the Elections Act related to broadcasters, in particular section 348, which says that the broadcaster must charge the lowest available rate to a political party seeking to place an ad on its platform. This ensures that political parties have access to the broadcasting networks, but it also ensures that they're charged substantially the same rate. Therefore, CTV cannot say, “We like this party, so we're going to charge them less. We don't like that party, so we're going to charge them more”.

Facebook's ad auction algorithm potentially increases a lot of variation and the price that an advertiser might pay to reach the exact same audience. That is something that I think is unwelcome because it could actually tilt the scale in one direction or another.

We have a bit of a black box problem with the ad auction system. Facebook doesn't tell us exactly how it works because it's their proprietary information, but on the basis of the information we know, I think that there is something there for regulation under section 348, even if we don't treat Facebook like a broadcaster more generally.

The second last thing is liability. One way to incentivize compliance with existing laws is imposing liability on social media platforms. Generally, they're not liable for the content posted on them, so one of the big questions, before this committee and the House in general, is whether there should be liability for repeated violations of norms around elections. I think that's something that we may need to consider.

The last point I wanted to make is simply on election cybersecurity, because I understand that's something of interest to the committee. Cybersecurity costs a lot of money. For example, I think that Canadian banks spend a lot of money trying to ensure cybersecurity. It may be difficult for political parties or entities involved in the electoral sphere. Political parties receive indirect public subsidies through the rebate system, say, for election expenses. One way to incentivize spending on cybersecurity is to have a rebate for political parties or other entities to spend money on cybersecurity. That's an idea that I've been trying to speak about quite a bit lately.

The last issue is that the U.S. has come out with very detailed protocols on what should happen among government agencies in the event of a cyber-attack, an unfortunate potential event, say, in the middle of the October 2019 election. What would the protocols be? There may be discussions that I'm not privy to between Elections Canada or the new cybersecurity agency. I hope there are, but the public needs to have some confidence about what procedures are followed, because if they don't know what the procedures are, there can be risks that an agency is seen as favouring one side or another, of foreign interference, potentially, on behalf of one party or one set of entities. I think that's pretty self-evident based on what has happened in the U.S.

Some more publicity around those protocols, I think, would be very welcome.

Thank you very much for your attention. I look forward to your questions in either official language.

[Greg Essensa, Chief Electoral Officer, Elections Ontario]

Good morning, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. I would like to begin by thanking the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs for inviting me to provide my observations on Bill C-76, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act and other acts and to make certain consequential amendments.

I welcome the chance to offer you my insights and observations on the electoral process. When I provide comments to a committee of the House of Commons, I am very aware that I am addressing Canada's lawmakers.

Today I would like to briefly address the following topics: the provisions of the bill and my observations from Ontario's 2018 general election.

In reviewing the provisions of this bill and other bills related to elections, I always ask myself whether the change protects the integrity of the electoral process, preserves fairness and promotes transparency. I have reviewed this bill closely and I offer the following observations.

The bill offers amendments that, if passed, would improve access and reduce barriers to voting. A number of the provisions in this bill were implemented in Ontario, and I am highly supportive of them.

I specifically want to highlight the provision that allows voter information cards as a piece of identification. The voter information card is a staple of electoral administration and, in my humble opinion, a core piece of the Canadian electoral fabric. The voter information card unites every elector group, giving them the confidence that they are registered, and provides them with the information they require to cast their ballot. This proposed amendment creates consistency with Ontario's identification requirements, and I applaud this government for recognizing its importance.

Additionally, lengthening the election calendar and extending advance poll hours are important amendments to contribute to the success of the election. I appreciate the flexibility that these provisions and others provide to the chief electoral officer. Election administrators are in the best position to make decisions on how elections are delivered. Allowing the chief electoral officer to make decisions on their mandates while complying with legislation is a key factor of success in overseeing elections.

I will now turn my attention to third party regulation. In 2016 Ontario implemented substantive reform with respect to election finances. While Ontario was undergoing significant electoral reform, I had been asked, and agreed, to serve as an adviser to the Standing Committee on General Government. This committee undertook an extensive process in consulting the public by travelling Ontario and hearing from interested individuals and stakeholder groups on the proposed legislation.

I also appeared three times in front of the standing committee to provide my thoughts on the provisions in this bill. My messaging in this area has been simple and consistent. The concept of the level playing field is central to our democracy. It is also a unifying principle of election administration, tying together the voting process and the campaign process.

Election outcomes are intended to reflect the genuine will of the people. Political finance rules are in place to ensure that all political actors have an equal opportunity to raise and spend funds to advance their message and win votes. Electoral outcomes should not be distorted because of unequal opportunities to influence the electorate. Third parties are no exception to this. Creating a regulation system for third parties is critical in creating a level playing field, and I am supportive of the proposed provisions in this bill.

There are amendments in this bill that align with Ontario's model, with some exceptions. Spending thresholds differ in Ontario compared with what is being proposed in Bill C-76. While I will not comment on the specific amounts and whether it is appropriate or not, what is important to me is that regulation be in place prior to the writ period and during the writ period. In Ontario, prior to the legislative reform in 2016, we never had pre-writ regulation. It was something I long advocated for because of the lack of transparency on what could be incurred by third parties in the six months leading up to an election.

One feature of Bill C-76 that I am quite supportive of is the requirement for third parties to provide interim reports. I believe this contributes to effective oversight and better transparency.

I would also like to highlight the area of foreign spending. I strongly support restricting third parties from using funds from a foreign entity. However, this bill does not address how it will regulate this source of funding. There are no requirements to disclose where third parties are receiving funding from, which could very well be from foreign entities. I highlight that for the committee to consider.

Overall, I view these provisions as a step in the right direction.

The next area I would like to address involves the provisions related to enforcement. In order to effectively enforce, it is important to provide regulators with the tools they require.

I am pleased to see the commissioner of Canada elections' ability to issue administrative monetary penalties, compel testimony and lay charges where he or she deems fit. I also believe it is appropriate that the commissioner of Canada elections be relocated to the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer. Being equipped with these tools allows the commissioner to fulfill the mandate effectively and maintain public trust by holding political actors accountable.

I would now like to focus the remainder of my time on my observations from Ontario's 2018 general election.

This year's election saw an unprecedented amount of change. Elections Ontario operationalized four different pieces of legislation in advance of the June 2018 election. These amendments enabled Ontario to implement new boundaries, new technology, new staffing models, new processes and modern tools for all elections-related stakeholders.

The 2018 general election in Ontario, in my humble opinion, was a great success, and the legislation helped support our efforts to provide greater access and modernized services to electors.

There are a few key areas that I'd like to highlight for your consideration.

The first is privacy and security. With an increased focus on personal data and intrusion into public networks, privacy and cybersecurity were and are top of mind.

This was the first general election where technology was implemented, including e-poll books to strike off electors and vote-counting equipment to count ballots.

In order to ensure security, we worked closely with the provincial security adviser, who was appointed by Ontario's secretary of cabinet. We went to him to seek advice on ensuring our processes and systems met thresholds and limited the risk of threat. In coordination with the provincial security adviser, Elections Ontario had a security expert carry out comprehensive audits of our systems, processes and people. The report recommended a number of actions that we implemented to reduce vulnerability.

There is little evidence to suggest that the 2018 general election in Ontario was significantly affected by cybersecurity intrusions, fake news or any other form of electronic interference.

The last area I'd like to speak to is third party spending. With a new regime in place, similar to Bill C-76, third parties now had registration requirements and spending limits for both the pre-writ and writ periods. In the 2018 general election we had a total of 59 third party registrants—34 in the six-month pre-writ period and 25 during the writ period. By comparison, in 2014 we only had 37 third parties registered in the writ period. This represented a 59% increase in the total number of third parties that registered compared to 2014.

At this time it is difficult to assess the overall impact of the new regulations, as we will not receive full financial filings until December of this year. However, I am confident that regulation significantly impacted how much money was spent on third party advertising. I will give you an example. In 2014, 37 registered third parties spent approximately $8.67 million during the writ period alone. In 2018, we had 25 third parties registered in the writ period who, combined, could only have spent $2.55 million under the new regime. This represents a decrease of more than $6.12 million in spending during the writ period. This is a significant reduction, and I look forward to seeing the final expenses of all third parties in December.

One area of challenge for us, though, was in registration requirements. In Ontario, similar to the provisions in Bill C-76, a third party is only required to register once it incurs $500 in expenses. This registration requirement was a challenge for us to navigate and regulate. We received numerous complaints on third parties, many of which had not registered with us, as they kept their spending under $500. The result was unregulated third party advertising. The difficulty we encountered was that many of these parties spent money on advertising exclusively through the Internet. This made it a challenge to ascertain if and when they went past the $500 threshold.

Third party registration is an area of reform I will be commenting on to Ontario's legislators early next year, and something you may wish to consider as a review in this bill.

I would finally like to take this opportunity to thank the committee for inviting me to speak and to offer my perspectives as chief electoral officer of Ontario. I applaud the work this committee is doing on electoral reform, and I would be happy to answer any questions you may have at this time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Good morning. Welcome to the 121st meeting of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs as we continue our study of Bill C-76, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act and other acts and to make certain consequential amendments.

We are pleased to be joined by Greg Essensa, the Chief Electoral Officer of Ontario. He is appearing by video conference from Toronto.

Thank you for making yourself available today, Mr. Essensa. I know you're very busy, so I'm glad we could finally get a time together. This is very exciting for us. We have lots of great questions.

You can proceed with some opening remarks. We did get your notes, but we haven't translated them yet, which means we can't circulate them yet.

If you would go ahead with your opening remarks, that would be great.

Democratic Reform

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, we agree with our colleagues across the way that there should not be any foreign interference. That is why I ask them to work with us at the procedure and House affairs committee to send Bill C-76 back to the House as soon as possible so we can pass the legislation to ensure that our elections are protected next election.

Let us work together. I hope my hon. colleagues across the way will get this done with us.

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Democratic Institutions]

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

It is vital that everyone in the House work together to avoid and prevent foreign influence and interference in our elections.

I am excited to work with everyone in the House to make sure we pass Bill C-76. In Bill C-76 are tangible measures to ensure we can prevent foreign interference. I hope my colleagues on the other side will work with us to get this legislation passed quickly to ensure that our next elections are protected.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Mr. Speaker, in response to a question in New York this week, the Prime Minister admitted to knowing that foreign money had influenced the 2015 federal election. Bill C-76 was supposed to close the loopholes in the election legislation, but it does nothing to stop foreign money from influencing our elections.

When is the Prime Minister going to take this issue seriously and stop foreign interests from influencing our elections?