Evidence of meeting #19 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 39th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was date.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
Yes, I will speak slowly. Speaking so slowly might require an appointment at Ottawa Hospital for a lobotomy because to speak this way is simply not in my nature. You have gotten to know me. Just imagine, Ms. Johnson might think I always speak at this rate!
Do not despair, Ms. Johnson. I got my lobotomy yesterday and am recovering well.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
Just a brief question, Ms. Johnson. Are municipal elections held on fixed dates in British Columbia?
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
Yes, municipal elections are held on fixed dates in British Columbia every three years.
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
They are held in November every three years, on a Saturday. I'm sorry, I don't know which Saturday.
Bloc
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
They have never overlapped?
The third Saturday...?
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
It's in November for the municipal elections. The provincial elections are on a fixed date in May.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
Do you have advice as to what date we should set? I’d like to reassure the government: that does not necessarily mean that my party opposes the bill; it’s only that there is overlap between municipal elections in Quebec and the date of October 19.
Based on your experience in democratic elections, do you believe there could be a problem if the date of federal elections, as proposed in Bill C-16 now under consideration, overlaps with that of municipal elections held in over 2,200 municipalities in Quebec? Do you see a problem or a risk of confusing the electorate?
It will be my last question. My time is up, anyway.
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
The only concern I would have about an overlap is the availability of voting locations and election workers. You will have the federal jurisdiction competing with the municipal authorities in Quebec for resources that frankly can be hard to come by. I don't know that the voters would necessarily be confused, but I do think the resource issue needs to be considered.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
Thank you very much.
Actually, you have one and a half minutes left.
Madame Picard, would you like to have a question? No? Okay. Thank you very much. We'll move on.
Yes?
Conservative
NDP
Paul Dewar NDP Ottawa Centre, ON
Thank you.
Hi, Ms. Johnson. It's Paul Dewar with the New Democratic Party. Appropriately, it's raining here today to make you feel at home.
I have a couple of questions.
In terms of the premier's prerogative, am I understanding correctly that the premier could still—notwithstanding the fixed election date legislation—walk down the street and ask to dissolve and call an election, or is that not within his realm now? Does he have to abide by the fixed election date, at least with a majority government?
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
I am certainly not an authority on this matter, but I do not see anything in the Constitution Act that would preclude the premier from requesting that the lieutenant governor dissolve the legislature. She has the prerogative to refuse.
NDP
Paul Dewar NDP Ottawa Centre, ON
Thank you.
We've talked a bit here about the fact that what we really have is flexible-fixed, because in a minority situation you could still have a confidence vote, the legislature could fall, and thus you would be into an election.
What I would like to know a bit about is outcomes. I was in British Columbia in the 1980s during an election, and there was what I think was called a section 87 that gave citizens the opportunity to have themselves put on the voters list on election day. That is, if you weren't on the list prior to the election, the only opportunity you had was on election day. This caused much dislocation. Has that changed now in your enumeration?
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
It has changed, and I think it's been significantly improved. The old section 80 registrations required...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...considered during our final count. It was...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...bit of an administrative nightmare.
Under our current statute, our new and improved section 41 allows unregistered eligible voters to register in conjunction with voting. However, if they are doing so at their assigned voting place for their place of residence, those ballots are treated like any other registered voters ballots. This has streamlined it considerably, and it's a very popular opportunity in British Columbia.
NDP
Paul Dewar NDP Ottawa Centre, ON
In summary, I just have two quick questions.
One, in terms of enumeration, did you find there was an improved enumeration process? That's question number one.
Question number two is that I'm interested in terms of outcomes, as some have said this would improve the opportunity for women, aboriginals, and visible minorities, both to present themselves as candidates.... I'm just wondering if you could comment on that. Did you have more candidates who were from those communities? And did you see a higher voter turnout—if you have that data—with regard to women, visible minorities, or aboriginals?
Thank you.
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
In terms of enumeration, British Columbia does not normally enumerate; we have a continuous voters list system. We did a targeted enumeration prior to the last election, and certainly the fixed date of the election was very helpful in allowing us to enumerate in close proximity to that event. So there was relevance there.
The organization does not maintain statistics regarding ethnicity, so I can't comment on participation by aboriginal persons, either as candidates or as voters. The increase in participation that we saw was primarily of youth, which went up somewhat, and we were very pleased about that, but otherwise, the increase in turnout seemed to be of both genders and across all age groups, with a slight boost in youth registration and participation. We...[Technical difficulty--Editor]...female candidates.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
Mr. Dewar, we did lose some feed there. I'm happy to offer you a bit more time for clarification, if you need that.
Deputy Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
We did not see an increase in female candidacy.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
Thank you, Ms. Johnson.
We are finished round one. We'll move to round two, which will also be five minutes. However, I mistakenly moved from Mr. Owen, who actually had two minutes and ten seconds left, so I will offer our Liberal colleagues an additional two minutes and ten seconds on this round if they need it.
Monsieur Proulx.
