Electoral Reform Committee on Oct. 17th, 2016

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you so much. I would like to thank our four witnesses for being here this evening, and thank the members of the audience for being here as well. It's my first time in Iqaluit and I hope it's not my last time. I would like to thank our member of Parliament for Nunavut, Hunter Tootoo, for welcoming us today.

I take a lot of notes, so you probably see me typing extensively. I have a lot of questions because you've given us a wealth of information this evening. What is resonating with me, I think, is bringing me back to my university days and Maslow's hierarchy of needs. We talked about physiological and safety needs—just shelter, water, food, and safety—and it really resonated with me that we need to fix a lot in conjunction with our electoral system, in addition to fixing our electoral system.

We talked a little bit about representation and the difficulty candidates have in pursuing elections. We talked a little bit about the fact that candidates have to live off their savings in one of the most expensive ridings in the country. You have to travel throughout the campaign by air, so when we talk about possibly having 16-year-olds to 25-year-olds running for office, how many 16-year-olds to 25-year-olds have the kind of capital to be able to run for office? How many single family breadwinners are able to put away that kind of money to then run for office? Those are limitations, given the unique challenges you have here in the north.

Mr. Buscemi, you brought up an interesting fact. You said we should be thinking about the geography as well as the population. On our previous panel, Mr. Chambers brought up Sweden, and he talked about each square kilometre being worth 1.6 people and how that could be a formula that could be used in terms of calculating the representatives that could be given to folks who are living in vast regions.

I'd like to get your thoughts on that, because yes, we need to address our electoral system, but we have a lot to work on here in the north. Could you let me know what you think about that?

[Franco Buscemi]

A lot of Inuits will share, and I think we would be happy to share our 1.6 persons per square kilometre as well. I definitely think that's a huge barrier for us in having adequate representation and adequate engagement. When we see the low voter turnout, that's a symptom of the lack of engagement, and it's not only with the voters in elections; it's also the engagement of elections with the people.

Again, Victor has brought up some great ideas that are being practised by other bodies, where they elect people with mobile polls. That is a very effective tool that they're using. Also, Mr. Okalik also brought up being able to elect our senator. I don't there are very many people who are satisfied with having a Senate. If you think he lives in Nunavut, then you need to check your facts again.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Okay. I won't comment.

That said, we talked a little bit about dual members. In 1997, I believe, you had the plebiscite to vote to have the two members, and you had a 39% turnout. I don't know why it was not repeated or whether, close to 20 years later, the issue ever came back as a possibility. I'm not sure if it did come back, but for something as fundamental as having equal representation in your legislative assembly, you couldn't get more than 40% of the population out to vote, and I think that had to do with a lack of information and so on and so forth. I didn't study the case extensively, but do you think it needs to be an issue of significant importance to the everyday lives of folks in Nunavut to get them to come out? Is it a one-off? How do we motivate folks to come out to address the issues we're bringing forward? The question of that 39% and why you didn't get the number out that needed to get out to vote is still hanging there.

Do you have some suggestions, Mr. Tootoo?

[Victor Tootoo]

You asked how many 16- to 25-year-olds can afford to run for an election. That assumes that 16- to 25-year-olds have exactly the same lifestyle as do 51-year-olds, and I don't think that's an accurate assumption. I just wanted to mention that.

There is the issue of dual-gender ridings. The 39% turnout in 1997 was pretty good compared to the turnouts for other elections in Nunavut, but yes, we didn't get 50% of the people to come out and vote on whether or not a dual-gender riding is a good idea.

When I think of a dual-gender riding, I think of a family and I think of how a family decision is made. I can speak only for my own personal example in my family. I have discussions with my wife about major things, and she has an equal say in what our family does. That's one of my own values. I'm not saying that everybody should think that way, but I am saying that I have personally seen that it makes for a better decision-making process. That's why I'm in support of advocating for better representation of women at a political level.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you very much.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

We'll go now to Mr. Boulerice.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

I have a much better decision-making process: she decides, and then she tells me what the decision is.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

It was a joke.

First of all, thank you very much for having us here. This is my first visit to Nunavut and Iqaluit. I learned a lot today.

Mr. Buscemi, thank you very much for your very sincere, very touching and very relevant presentation. I will remember it a long time.

You will understand why it is good for a kid from Montreal like me to get out and come to a place like this. I did some comparisons. My riding is five times smaller than the city of Iqaluit, but it has 22 times more inhabitants. And so I live in a completely different universe. I use my bike to go to meetings in my riding.

We are tackling a serious problem here, the representativeness of our electoral system. I carried out my own little research project for comparative purposes. You have before you 12 federal members, and only two of them obtained the majority of the votes in their riding. This was—to give credit where credit is due—Mr. Scarpaleggia, and Ms. May.

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

And I was another.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Oh, was that the case? Then there were three.

Several others almost got there. Mr. DeCourcey was very close. Mr. Richards was another. Nevertheless, this is quite representative of what happened during the last election.

We have been saying all along that it is important that we increase electoral participation and that people have to get out and vote. But their vote has to mean something. In the majority of cases, half of the votes did not elect any member. If we increase voter turnout but people see that their voice is not represented in Parliament, we won't have solved the problem, in my opinion.

In the last election, nine million votes went to elect members, and nine million votes were lost. What I like about more proportional systems is that even if a person did not vote for the candidate who was elected locally, their vote will still find a voice and be represented in the federal Parliament.

In vast territories like yours, the challenge is to find a way to increase proportionality with only one member. That is difficult.

My question is addressed to the four witnesses.

Would you be open to the possibility of adding a member for Nunavut, or a member for each of the three large northern regions? Each territory would have its local member, and others would be added to represent the three large ridings of Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut.

[Franco Buscemi]

Thank you.

I think that this community probably feels the pressure that perhaps our MP feels, in that right now you're attacking a single problem, a single issue, that was brought up in the election for the whole country. That's a lot of land, and there's a lot of consideration.

If I understood you correctly about the three regions being the three territories, I don't think it would be very good to put that potential onus on people from Nunavut. I do not want the onus on me of having someone else represent another region, and I would hope that our neighbours in NWT and Yukon also feel that they don't feel adequately informed to select who should represent us.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Do you have any comments to add?

[Paul Okalik]

The reason we created Nunavut was to focus on our territory and our unique culture. I think having one MP representing all three territories would not be seen favourably by our territory.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

I was referring to three local members, plus one other.

[Paul Okalik]

I know. It was adding one more, to have one additional member—

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

It would not be welcomed.

[Paul Okalik]

It would not be much progress, because we created Nunavut to focus on our priorities, and one additional MP for the whole north would defeat that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you, Mr. Boulerice.

Mr. Nater, you now have the floor.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our panellists for an excellent discussion so far.

I'm going to jump around on a couple of different issues, and I'll see where I'll get.

I want to start with Mr. Okalik and talk a bit more about the consensus style of government here and the challenges you mentioned about accountability. I want to talk about the mid-term review, but I want to bring it back to electoral accountability.

Can you bring us a few insights into how campaigns unfold at the constituency level? How does an incumbent campaign when they have very little they can overtly promise? Does it become a mushy middle-type thing, where very little is promised and it's more based on personality? How does something unfold if you're boxed in at the constituency level?

[Paul Okalik]

The challenge with our current system is that you can promise the moon, and then you can get elected and get the one term. The way I run my campaigns is that I look at the territory. Fortunately, I have a very good riding that reflects our territory and the populace. I work on what issues they're facing, and it works well with the rest of the territory. It's been working for me. I'm on my fourth term as the member for Iqaluit.

It's a very challenging way of governance, because you can't really promise things, other than what you can work out with your colleagues maybe someday. It's trying to focus on what might work for the territory and then working with my colleagues in the assembly afterwards to try to make it happen and reflect the mandate that is produced at the end.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Both you and Mr. Tootoo have mentioned the challenge of the timing of elections. At the federal level, we do have a fixed elections act. It may not be as strong as some would like it to be. Is that a small step that ought to be taken at the federal level, and potentially the territorial levels as well, so that an Elections Act date is fixed that is more attuned to the weather, the climate, and the hunting patterns here in the north? Would that be kind of...?

[Paul Okalik]

Very much so. We need to change our act, as well, to set a fixed date to reflect our cultural practices. It's fixed for four years, and whatever works for the entire country is something that.... I believe it's the third Monday of October in the current federal system, so there's no real issue there, but as you know in governing, if you fall, the election can be called at any time. The concern I have with mandatory requirements is that the election can fall in the middle of our hunting season or in the middle of something rather important for our family, so making it mandatory would be difficult for us in that way.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Extending from that, would a longer voting period be beneficial as well, or is it...?