Bill C-20 (39th Parliament, 2nd Session) Committee on April 9th, 2008

[Marc Mayrand]

Yes, absolutely.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Our concern is actually how such a proposed consultation would take place in a province the size of Ontario with no spending limits. As you say, it's not really legally codified for Elections Canada. There would certainly need to be monitoring. What kind of technical support would you need on the ground to ensure that--perhaps one elected senator for the entire province of Ontario--the consultation process that was under way was being done in some kind of open and fair system, so at the end of the day, even if the Prime Minister didn't choose the elected person, we could at least say it was a fair process?

[Marc Mayrand]

We can certainly come back with more specific--

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Have you looked into any of those technical problems that you would face? Do you have any sense of that?

[Marc Mayrand]

I'm sorry. Maybe I missed your question.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

You wouldn't be the first one. I'm interested in whether you have looked at the technical problems that would be faced trying to run such a consultation process in a province the size of Ontario if, for example, there was one opening.

[Marc Mayrand]

If it's run in conjunction with the federal election, and there are a number of vacancies in Ontario, and there's a consultation at the same time as the federal election, we will certainly borrow very much and rely very much on the logistics that exist for conducting the federal election.

Where there would be more uncertainty--because again there would have to be a fair bit of discussion--is if it were run in conjunction with the provincial election. That's a different animal--if I can say that--about which we have not really had any detailed discussion with other electoral bodies at this point in time.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I guess the issue in terms of an election in Ontario, where there are 100 seats and there may be three openings, is that it would be very difficult to run in conjunction with the federal election taking place in Ontario, because you have a whole series of other elements you have to look out for, even as far as ensuring there's some kind of transparency and fairness among potentially five candidates vying for three spots in 100 ridings goes. Have you looked at those issues?

[The Chair, Liberal, Albina Guarnieri]

Your time has expired, Mr. Angus.

Mr. Reid.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Mayrand and your team, for coming out to our committee and for your very thorough presentation.

I wanted to start with two comments, followed by two questions to you. First, I have a comment relating to something Mr. Murphy had raised. He expressed a concern that I think was misplaced, and he indicated, as I understand it, that he was afraid that in a province like his own, where there is a majority of English speakers and a minority of French-speaking residents, the majority would never elect a French-speaking person. I think that's an ill-placed fear. History shows, of course, that Louis Robichaud, for example, was able to get elected in New Brunswick. He was an Acadian, and it suggests to me there is no underlying problem in Canada. There are lots of other examples of people being elected who are not members of the local majority. There's no problem in Canada with enlightened voters. I think he need not fear that.

My second comment relates to one of your suggestions, Mr. Mayrand, on the subject of having a regulation giving a power similar to that used under section 7 of the Referendum Act. This is a suggestion you made in your presentation. I think that's a good idea. I think that would provide a model that's already being used that might be very helpful. I'm glad you pointed that out, and I appreciate that. You can comment on that further if you wish, but I just wanted to indicate that I thought it was a good idea.

I turn now to the question you raised on page 12 of your presentation regarding the resources required for plurality voting. You indicated that if we have an interim system and a final system, the final system being STV and the earlier system being a kind of multi-member plurality voting, this would add time, which you think can be recovered, if it's not done. How much extra time are we talking about, in your opinion? I assume you got a recommendation from your consultants on this.

[Marc Mayrand]

For the STV it's three years. We would need three years from royal assent.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

And for the plurality voting system?

[Marc Mayrand]

The firm did not look at that.

I'm pointing out that what's being proposed is a transitional system that would be in place for a year, before the end of the second year, between year one and year two, with no certainty that a consultation would occur. The question arises as to whether the efforts to get ready for that are worth it. Even though it's a much easier system compared with STV, there are still all sorts of efforts needed in terms of technology, and in terms of training and making sure that candidates understand the rules, etc. The question is whether the efforts related to that are worth it, given that at the same time we would have to be ready for the STV regime, which would kick in the year after—again with no certainty that the consultations would be held in that interim period. So that's the point.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

I'm assuming that part of the time constraint you're looking at is based upon trying to come up with a system of having machine readable ballots. Am I correct in assuming that?

[Marc Mayrand]

That's one option we would consider.

I think the act is flexible enough to allow either human data entry or ballots that are scanned.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

One of the things that was suggested at the previous meeting of this committee by my colleague, Mr. Lukiwski—who isn't here today—is that instead of having a system in which voters assign a number to each candidate, we could achieve the same result by having a grid. On the X axis you would have the candidates listed; on the Y axis you would have, essentially, spots starting with number one through whatever the top number is. If you wanted to put Candidate Jones as your first candidate, you'd put an X into spot number one beside Candidate Jones' name, and so on for all the other candidates.

This would lead to something that I think would be quite easily machine readable. In terms of its physical size, it would be a large ballot for a large province, but I suspect it would not be any larger than a ballot in which numbers are listed off from one through to whatever, based on what I've seen of the Australian STV system for their Senate elections, and in larger states, such as New South Wales--which is, roughly speaking, the same size as Ontario.

I wonder if adopting the bill to allow for that would have the effect of making the process of coming up with machine-readable ballots easier and hence reduce the time constraints involved, from your perspective.

[Marc Mayrand]

It's an option that we would need to consider. There's a provision in the bill that asks us to publish the design of the ballot; before doing that, we would certainly examine various alternatives.

The only consideration there—and again, we need to learn a lot more about what's happening around the world in this area—is that if we have 16 registered parties, as we currently have, and there are, let's say, seven seats available, there could be a large number of candidates, and I'm not sure if the design could still accommodate that. Maybe it could.

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON]

That's a good question. Those, actually, are roughly the numbers you'd be looking at in a place like New South Wales. You have, typically, six vacancies at a time. Good heavens, I'm astonished at the number of parties. It's a very, very large number.

I had one other question here. Just with regard to clause 33, you had some concerns about that, and in particular you said you were worried about the difficulty of being neutral in providing information to voters. You suggested that instead of putting forward a booklet or a pamphlet, a subsidy be provided to nominees in order that they could distribute information about themselves.

Respectfully, I think you've misunderstood what clause 33 calls for. Clause 33 is the subsidy to the voters. Effectively, the idea is to transmit a single document, a single booklet, to voters that contains information of a certain length. I assume the prescribed length would be determined by your office, but otherwise the content would be left up to the candidates, who could be as partisan as they wanted to be.

I'm just reading clause 33, which says, and I quote:

On the day after they are notified of their confirmation, a nominee shall provide information pertaining to the nominee in the prescribed form to the Chief Electoral Officer.

I assume “prescribed form” refers to length and probably to things like sending it to you in Word, as opposed to some other program.

Then:

The Chief Electoral Officer shall compile information provided by nominees into an elector information guide to be distributed to all households in the province.

There's no expectation of non-partisanship here. It's expected to be partisan information, on the model of the booklets that are distributed during referenda in California, for example, or the various Swiss cantons, where there's no attempt at neutrality. Your job would simply be to make sure that Candidate A can't provide a much larger quantity of information about himself than Candidate B is permitted to provide, and so on. But I think you can see how that would allow all the households in the province to be provided with information about all candidates, while still maintaining a modest minimum cost for those who are, for example, independent candidates or who are not able to raise substantial amounts of money.

[The Chair, Liberal, Albina Guarnieri]

Thank you, Mr. Reid.

Mr. Mayrand.

[Marc Mayrand]

I understand the intent of helping all candidates. I think it's a matter of a level playing field, in some regard, ensuring that all candidates have the opportunity to share their message with all electors. My concern is with regard to the responsibility of Elections Canada. My sense is that there's not enough direction in clause 33 with regard to the content.

To what extent is there promotion of the candidate, promotion of the political message or the political platform? Is it okay to undermine a candidate in the information you present? There are all sorts of issues in which, for now, Elections Canada has never been involved. Again, I'm concerned that it brings us too close to the messaging, as opposed to, again, administering the process objectively and independently. That's why I was suggesting maybe it's better to leave it to candidates, with a reasonable subsidy to cover the expenses in that regard. That's another option.

If it were to remain in the act, I would certainly prefer that there be more direction, more clarity, in clause 33. Again, if there is advocacy in those guides, certainly we need to make sure that this does not represent the views in any way or form of Elections Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Albina Guarnieri]

Thank you, Mr. Mayrand.

Madam Folco.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good afternoon, Mr. Mayrand. I am very pleased to welcome you and the members of your team to the meeting today.

I have two important questions for you. The first relates to the powers of the Prime Minister once people have been elected. As I understand it—and I do not have the specific clause in front of me—the Prime Minister has the option of choosing new senators from the list of those elected or selecting people who are not on the list.

Am I mistaken about that?

[Marc Mayrand]

From what I understand, that is correct. The Prime Minister is not bound by the choices made by the voters in the consultation.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Indeed. Now, my question is this: if a Prime Minister has no obligation to choose from among the names on the list of elected nominees, what is the point of engaging in this kind of exercise all across the Canada? The result is not a certainty when, in actual fact, the names of those who were elected should automatically be placed on the list of senators, as happens for members of Parliament, where the list of elected MPs is exactly the same as the list of people seated in the House of Commons.

In this case, what would be the point of this whole election exercise?

[Marc Mayrand]

There is no legal obligation for the Prime Minister—at least, no legally defined obligation set out in the legislation, as currently worded. It is obvious—and I understand this—that for constitutional reasons, no such obligation is identified in the legislation, but I think one can expect that, if a consultation is held province-wide, it would probably be quite difficult for the Prime Minister or Governor General—as this remains the prerogative of the Governor General—to ignore the choice made by voters.