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.

Elections Modernization Act

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

Mr. Speaker, I have known my colleague and friend for some years. We have been in this place for a while and have seen a couple of ups and downs. I too share one of the concerns she has raised, which is the participation of young people and the growing sense of cynicism.

I would offer her party and leader this compliment. In the last election, they tapped into that sense of desperation and fear about our elections. A great number of young people supported her and her party with a sense that the current government would be different. Clearly, that was the promise.

When the Prime Minister was a candidate, he made some significant promises around our democracy that were quite captivating, particularly to young and progressive folks. One of them, of course, is the now infamous promise that 2015 would be the last election under first past the post. A number of my colleagues on her side got to share the experience of what that betrayal was like once the government said no.

Specifically on this, in general, a lot of people now get much of their news from social media. That is a leading way of distributing information. One of the risks to politics is the spreading of what is called misinformation and disinformation. We are combining that new power with the power of large, significant and complex databases. That is information that all parties gather on individual voters, not groups of voters, as she well knows, from the 1990s and early 2000s. The information we now have on individual voters, voting preference, voting history, age, telephone number, religious affiliations, sexual orientation, all sorts of incredibly personal information is gathered by political parties, yet there are no rules in place right now that say the parties have to keep any standards in protecting that privacy or what they do with that data. We are combining the great power of social media and being able to target individual voters.

On Bill C-76, the Chief Electoral Officer recommended strengthening privacy rules. The New Democrats put forward amendments to do that and the government rejected all of them. Why?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to acknowledge the great work of my colleague. Sometimes I think we have all been here a little too long, but he has done some great work. It was terrific to work with him. I look forward to maybe another four or five years in the House of Commons, working together on issues that matter to Canadians.

Yes, that is a concern. Bill C-76 attempts to strengthen that as much as possible as we move forward. However, we have the challenge of social media, protecting individual rights and privacy rights. I note the bill stipulates that parties have to keep a list of all individuals called, with their phone numbers. There is a variety of things in Bill C-76 that attempt to strengthen that.

There will always be areas we can improve on and I expect there will be other changes after the next election on ways to continue to meet the current challenges that face us all.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have risen the House a few times to talk about the 2011 election, when Guelph was targeted as a centre for robocalls and what that did to the people working on behalf of Elections Canada, whether they would volunteer again knowing that the ground was shifting under their feet.

Looking at the strengthening of the position of the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada and the ability to prosecute crimes that occur during elections, we have come a long way with Bill C-76, trying to undo the unfair elections act.

Could the hon. member comment on how important it is for us to have a strong regime with respect to the Canada Elections Act and the implementation of our elections?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the 2011 election was very discouraging to the people who worked on the elections. Candidates were also very discouraged as a result of finding out that a lot of irregularities were happening, but not a whole lot was being done. Strengthening services for the Commissioner of Elections Canada is important in order to provide the ability to give serious penalties to people who violate and interfere with our democracy. It is too important a treasure for us. Anybody who interferes needs to receive a very stiff penalty so it does not happen again.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, Employment Insurance; the hon. member for Calgary Rocky Ridge, Natural Resources; and the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni, Veterans Affairs.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my great friend and colleague, the member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith.

I am looking at the clock right now and I see that we have little more than half an hour left in this debate. It is a sad state of affairs for a bill that really covers such an important law in which every Canadian has so much vested, not the least of whom are members of the House, that we have to debate it under the yoke of time allocation.

The rush is all the making of the Liberals. We have heard repeatedly about Bill C-33, the first attempt by the Liberals at amending our election laws. That bill was introduced on November 24, 2016, and it is about as far as it got. It stayed at first reading. The member for Perth—Wellington called it a very unloved bill because it seemed to have been forgotten by the Liberal government.

Bill C-33 languished for many months and then finally on April 30 of this year, Bill C-76 was brought in, which swallowed up Bill C-33 but added a whole bunch more.

Then the sense of urgency came. The Liberals suddenly became aware of the timelines they had to deal with this. The Liberal government has a clear majority. It has commanding control over the agenda of the House. The Liberals came to power with an ambitious election agenda, and they are making us pay for their laggardness.

The bill came back to the House for report stage last week. On Thursday, October 25, the government moved time allocation. We really only had a few days to debate the bill, which started on Wednesday afternoon. On Thursday, the Dutch prime minister was here, so it was not a full day. We debated the bill on Friday afternoon. On Monday, the government decided to debate Bill C-84 and Bill C-85. We had the votes at report stage last night, Here we are on Tuesday, the final day to debate the bill at third reading.

It makes a mockery out of the Prime Minister's promise to treat this institution with respect when he rams the bill through, especially when the amendments that were looked at in committee and at report stage were backed up by such solid evidence. The Liberals have demonstrated time and again that it is their way or the highway.

We have to place all of this within the context of the biggest promise the Liberals made with respect to electoral reform, and that was that 2015 would be the last election held under first past the post. Why does this matter? When the hon. clerks at the table read out the tally of the votes, we do not approve a motion with 39% support, yet that is precisely what happens in this place. The Liberals do have a majority government, but it was elected by 39% of the people.

If we truly believe that every vote should count equally, then the House of Commons should reflect how people voted. I certainly wish the Liberals had followed through on their promise, that they had listened to the evidence that was gathered by the special committee on electoral reform and at least had progressed.

If the Liberals want to see how it is really done, they need to look no further than the province of British Columbia, where a B.C. NDP government, led by my friend Premier John Horgan, who is also a constituent, is following through with a promise.

Right now B.C. is having a referendum on electoral reform. I was happy to cast my ballot last weekend in support of proportional representation. This is a great opportunity for the province of B.C. to lead the way on electoral reform. It is a great way to show Canadians that on this issue, if they want progress, if they want a government that keeps its promise, they will vote NDP. John Horgan and the NDP are showing that.

I want to move on because I do not want to be entirely negative. There are some important things in the bill that we support. Many of the changes in Bill C-76 are just simple reversals of the Conservative bill from 2014.

For example, Bill C-76 would reinstate vouching for identity. It would restore the voter ID card. It would remove restrictions on how the Chief Electoral Officer and Elections Canada could communicate with voters. These are all good things and we support them.

On a personal note, the government has incorporated the idea behind my private member's bill, Bill C-279, which I introduced in 2016. That bill sought to limit the length of elections. I think all members, and indeed Canadians, would be very happy if we did not have to go through a 78-day marathon campaign anymore. Seriously, there needs to be a limit on the length of elections, especially with the changes the Conservatives brought in under its government. It greatly expanded how much political parties could spend every day we went past 36 days. I do not think anyone could argue in favour of Canadians needing 78 days to make their decision. Therefore, I am glad to see there is a hard limit of 50 days on the length of elections.

I am also happy to see that Elections Canada would now be able to access information from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. One of the great things I do as a member of Parliament, pretty much every month, is I get a list of new citizens who recently acquired their citizenship. I get to write certificates, congratulating them on acquiring their citizenship and welcoming them as future electors of Canada. If Elections Canada is able to update its registry in co-operation with another government department, all the better. I think every party in this place wants to see more people participate.

The early registration of teenagers, age 14 to 17, is a great step forward. One of the other things I really enjoy doing as a member of Parliament is visiting all the high schools in my riding. When we make efforts to speak to students, especially grade 11 and 12 students, they are actually a very thoughtful and engaged group. They care very much about their future. They care about climate change, about very progressive ideals. I have really valued my exchanges with them. With early registration as voters, it gives them another impetus to get the buy-in to the system so when they turn 18, they can actually go and cast their ballot.

I was fortunate enough to turn 18 in 1997, an election year, and I got to cast my ballot. I can remember doing that with a lot of pride.

Removing the ban on public education by the Chief Electoral Officer is also a great thing, as well as extending the hours of advanced polls. These are all positive measures in my view.

That is not to say that there are not problems. One of the biggest gaps, and it has been clearly identified by the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley, who has been doing yeoman's work on this bill on behalf of the NDP, is the privacy rules covering political parties. Every political party in this place gathers a lot of information on Canadians. We know generally how many people live in a household, what their ages are, their genders and, in some cases, what their professions are.

We live in a time now where information warfare is a fact. Hacking is a fact. We need look no further than the examples of the Brexit vote and the recent election in the United States. It would be absolutely foolish of us to pretend it will not to affect Canada. Unfortunately, despite all the evidence that was heard at the procedure and House affairs committee, not only from the Privacy Commissioner but a whole host of experts, the Liberals cynically ignored this important provision. They decided not to strengthen privacy laws covering political parties. Also, nothing was really done with respect to election ads on social media and the Internet.

One of the big things is this. I remember the Liberals amended their own bill at committee to remove the requirement of political parties to keep receipts for their spending. This is the Liberals at committee amending their own bill to take that out. Last night, through report stage amendments, we tried to insert that back in, through vote no. 12. It was voted against. The Chief Electoral Officer has been calling for this since the 38th Parliament. For a party that likes to sing praises of the Chief Electoral Officer, to repeatedly ignore his recommendations and his calls to action on so many occasions makes a mockery of the Liberal statements in this place.

We also tried to move the voting day to Sunday, which I think would have encouraged more participation. On a Monday, I know everyone is entitled to get those hours off, but it sometimes does not always work out.

We tried to be constructive with the bill. Despite the many flaws that exist, we will vote to send it to the other place. However, I will be reminding Canadians of the opportunities that were lost, the opportunities that we attempted to address and the Liberals' flagrant attempts to ignore all of those constructive proposals.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, at the very start I recognize that the NDP members had a series of amendments they were proposing at the committee stage, and they were not alone. There were also many more amendments from the Conservative Party. As well, there were many suggestions and recommendations from the presenters, including Elections Canada.

What was really encouraging in what came out of that committee stage was that we had many amendments accepted. There were amendments from all parties, in fact. Even the Green Party had direct input in making sure there were some amendments brought forward. Today the legislation is healthier as a direct result. I realize that maybe not everything was accepted that members would have liked. Some of it, no doubt, could be very easily justified.

I just wanted to provide more of a comment than a question.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I very much accept what the hon. member said. Many amendments were moved. Some were accepted, some were not.

The problem is that we are not having enough time to debate. Report stage is already over and we are now at third reading. The Liberal government has not given this House enough time to deliberate what happened at committee. It goes right against what the Liberals themselves proposed on April 10, 2014.

The member for Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame, the member for Malpeque and even the member for Winnipeg North have stood in this place repeatedly to argue that time allocation measures should not be used any time this House is deliberating on our election laws.

That is the big issue I have, not so much with the amendments but with this House's ability to democratically deliberate on those measures.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was just wondering if my colleague for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford could comment on two things for us. He highlighted some of the hypocrisy of the current government. It is always good to criticize there, but how can we make it better? As well, his party is going to vote to send it to the other place.

I was wondering if my colleague would be supportive of strengthening things in this bill to keep foreign entities from undermining our democratic institutions. It is one of the things we are worried about, and it is a reality today. There are other governments that want to influence the Canadian process with big money being brought in here, and there is not enough in this bill to address that.

Also, however, with regard to by-elections, it seems the government is cherry-picking when they should be taking place. It is stalling three really important by-elections in which Canadians should have a voice.

I was wondering if my colleague could comment on those two issues.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I once substituted at the ethics committee when they were looking into Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. There are some great concerns about data harvesting and the foreign influence that goes through that. I know the ethics committee is doing some great work peeling back the layers of the onion to discover how deep the rot goes. It is something we absolutely have to be on guard against in this time and age.

I agree with the member with respect to by-elections. The Liberals, let us face it, do not have a good excuse for delaying the calling of those by-elections. It is no secret that 300,000 Canadians who would vote in those remaining by-elections are without representation in this place. Our leader announced that he was going to run on August 8. It was very clear.

We look forward to seeing the Liberals actually live up to their promises to call those by-elections, making sure those unrepresented Canadians get members of Parliament in this place. That is the right thing to do.

[Murray Rankin, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Mr. Speaker, through you, I would like to ask my colleague for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford why he thinks the Liberals chose to not go ahead with getting receipts to prove there has been no fraud in an election, and why they took that out of the bill at the eleventh hour.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure I can accurately answer that. It is a question I will be posing to my constituents, and maybe to the Liberal candidate for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford during the next election. What was his political party so afraid of that it will not produce receipts for what it spent on advertising?

If the Chief Electoral Officer is going to have these investigative powers, it makes sense that the political parties should be compelled to not only store the receipts but hand them over to the Chief Electoral Officer. We are really talking about transparency, openness and making sure political parties play by the rules. That seems to me to be an easy fix.

I will let the Liberal candidate explain that in my riding in 2019.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to stand in this place and speak to the Liberals' attempt to fix the Harper Conservatives' unfair elections act. The bill we are debating today is Bill C-76.

How did we get here? The 2015 election campaign and the lead-up to it were certainly full of people's very legitimate and impassioned opposition and protests against the ransacking of the Elections Act. The dismantling of many of our electoral and democratic processes is certainly well documented. Whether it had been the New Democrats or Liberals who were elected to government, there was a very clear mandate from the electorate that the new government was to repair the Elections Act and roll back the unfair elections act that the Harper Conservatives had brought in.

What happened next? First of all, there is no other way to say it, the Liberals ragged the puck on their commitment to fulfill their election promise to make every vote count. Moving to a proportional representation system would have brought Canada in line with 90% of the democracies around the world, which do not use first past the post as a way to choose their members. Under such a new system, a party that got 39% of the vote would get 39% of the seats in this place.

I believe it was an election promise made by the Prime Minister 1,500 times. He was slow to establish the committee. I am very glad he took the advice of my New Democrat colleague, the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley, who proposed forming a proportional parliamentary committee. The Liberal government did not get the majority of the votes, nor did it have the majority of the seats on that committee. Also, for the first time ever, the committee included representation from members from the Bloc and the Green Party.

Nevertheless, there were 33,000 submissions from around the country, including some very innovative online submissions from people who used Twitter and other social media to get their comments and questions to the committee. There were hundreds of experts. The broad consensus was not to use the Prime Minister's preferred alternative, which was ranked ballot, but instead to move to a proportional form of voting.

Rudely and abruptly, it was pulled by the new democratic reform minister and cancelled entirely by the Prime Minister, bailing on a serious election promise.

That was one chapter in our attempt to fulfill the government's mandate. We tried to help but the government did not take up our offer. As my colleague, the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, has just pointed out, British Columbia is voting in a referendum right now on whether to make every vote count. It is being done by mail-in ballot. I hope everybody will do their research, through Fair Vote Canada and the other organizations providing information to help people make the right choice. I am certainly going to be voting yes in the mail-in referendum, and hope others do too.

As for amending the Elections Act, the government took a year to do anything about it. The government introduced a bill, then sat on it for two full years. It then brought in this most recent version of the bill, on which we have had zero debate at this point. It brought in a new version of the bill, which was again stalled over the summer. Finally, it was up for debate in the House, and the government promptly invoked closure and stifled debate on the bill at every stage. Therefore, here we are in the final moments of the debate.

Deadlines have been missed. The Chief Electoral Officer said there had to be a complete, fully adopted bill in his hands by April 30, 2018, which was six months ago. Instead, the day after the deadline, the Liberals tabled this new bill. It is not enough time to get the job done.

Here we are. This is vitally important work. We have an election less than a year away, and yet we still do not have an adopted bill. The New Democrats have proposed one amendment after another and tried to be constructive in this process. I am very discouraged that the government failed to take our advice and that of the Chief Electoral Officer in a number of important areas.

For example, to be able to investigate spending, the Chief Electoral Officer needs to be able to see receipts provided by political parties when they spend in elections. As candidates, we are required to do that. If I buy a box of Timbits, I have to show that receipt and have it available for public view. It is not so for political parties. How can that evidence be compelled in a case where an investigation is needed?

The Liberals originally had that in Bill C-76. They then removed it from their bill. The New Democrats brought a motion forward to bring it back in, and the Liberals voted it down. The Chief Electoral Officer says he wants this amendment, yet it is still not in this bill. This is a lost opportunity to strengthen our democracy and transparency, things the government says it is all about.

Another failure of this bill is that it does not do enough to regulate advertising on digital platforms. Between Russia, Trump and Brexit, there have been ample examples of the ability for digital platforms to interfere with election results. There was a missed generational opportunity by the government to bring in legislation that would deal with that adequately. A year from now, arguably, our election will be vulnerable to deceitful messaging and disinformation at election time.

Another failure is that this bill, in the words of the Privacy Commissioner himself, “adds nothing of substance in terms of privacy protection.”

Right now, there is no oversight for political parties and how they store and manage data. There are no privacy rules applying to political parties right now. The Privacy Commissioner, the Chief Electoral Officer, the BC Civil Liberties Association and witnesses testifying from our counterparts in Europe all said our election process needs data protection.

The minister herself asked Canada's spy agency for advice. They said this bill is not strong enough, yet the Liberals rejected every amendment the New Democrats brought forward. There is only an unenforceable statement that political parties are meant to put on their website, but that is certainly not enough. Every witness at committee said that the status quo is not acceptable, and that this bill failed to provide the strength we really needed in this reform.

Another disappointment is a piece that I am personally very invested in, given that it is 2018 but this House only has 25% women elected. I am proud of my own party, the NDP, because we have extra measures built in to our nomination process, and 43% of New Democrat candidates offered for election in 2015 were women or members of equity-seeking groups. As a result, our caucus is 40% women.

It is not so for the Liberals and not so for the Conservatives. They do not have the same measures. My colleague, former member of Parliament and now mayor of Vancouver Kennedy Stewart brought forward a bill proposing incentives to parties that offered the public more gender-balanced candidate slates. The government voted it down. In the past few months, when the NDP tried to insert the same measures into the bill at committee, again our members were voted down.

This is taxpayer money. For example, taxpayers paid back the Conservatives $21 million in election spending rebates for 2015. Less of that would have gone to the Conservatives given that they only elected 17% women to their caucus. It is a great disappointment that that incentive did not move forward.

There were a few pieces that worked. I am very glad the private member's legislation by my colleague, the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, was bundled into the bill. That legislation proposed a shortening of the election period, so that we do not have to go through the same suffering we did in 2015. We are glad the government did that.

We are glad this bill reinstates vouching for identity. We are glad it restores the voter ID card. However, to go back to vouching, we still have a big hole. I could be in a gym on election night with my neighbour who lives across the street but is not actually in the same poll. If I asked him to vouch for me so that I am able to vote because I do not seem to be on the voters list, that would not be possible, even though we are in the same gymnasium with the same volunteers.

For the government to not go all the way and take all the advice it received to make this bill as strong as it could have been represents another failure in Bill C-76. It is a disappointment and, again, a generational opportunity lost.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the legislation provides a wonderful opportunity to modernize the Canada Elections Act. We have seen significant amendments. Elections Canada had well over 100 recommendations and more than 80% of them have been incorporated in the legislation. We have made many changes to reverse what Stephen Harper did when he was the prime minister, when he took away things like the voter information card. There is a lot of good news in this legislation.

We appreciate and recognize that the New Democrats and the Green Party will vote in favour of the legislation, and no doubt there will be ongoing discussions and debates in the future on things that we might be able to do. However, at the end of the day, I believe we have good, sound legislation. It was first introduced by the department, went through the committee process, and ultimately will pass. It is important to recognize that.

Moreover, I recognize that most parties, with the exception of the Conservative Party, would like to see this legislation enacted before the next election. Does the member not see that as a positive thing?

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I find this to be another area where the Liberal government has entirely failed to use the power of its majority and the good mandate given to it by the people of Canada to go all the way and repair the damage done. I am in good company here.

Marc Maynard, the former chief electoral officer, said, “How can they pretend to impose all sorts of rules on Facebook and Google and all other social media when they are declining to have them apply to themselves?”

Teresa Scassa, the Canada research chair in information law at the University of Ottawa, called it “an almost contemptuous and entirely cosmetic quick fix designed to deflect attention from the very serious privacy issues raised by the use of personal information by political parties.”

In the all-day debate the Liberals chose to bring to this place on April 10, 2014, the member for Winnipeg North said, “This legislation”—relating to the Elections Act—“should be designated such that time allocation cannot be applied to it.” His government, under his leadership, has brought in time allocation again and again. He should be ashamed.