Evidence of meeting #25 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 person.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:30 p.m.
Conservative
Joe Preston Conservative Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON
Yes, it's not always the fact that it's not a person; it could be the fact that we have a typo on the card.
12:30 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Yes. Our information—and I don't have complete information—is that our lists are as good as or better than what the private sector has when they rely on that address. But no one in the private sector, no one anywhere, will tell you that there is 100% accuracy. I'll never achieve it, and if I'm held to achieve it, I'm going to tell you right now that I'll never achieve it. Never.
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Conservative
12:30 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
You have excellence, but we want better than excellence. You have excellence.
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Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
Thank you, members.
I think we've pretty much covered everything with respect to the government's response.
Sir, you have agreed to get back to us on various forms of identification that you want the committee to consider as acceptable.
There was one issue that came up in the report that we did not cover today. If you want to respond, then mail it in. That happens to be about simpler and fairer ways of paid and free political broadcasting, which was something that did not come up at today's meeting.
What I'm understanding from the committee is that we want to follow up on the bingo card forum, and we will do that at some future date, just so everybody's clear and the records are clear.
I think that summarizes and completes our meeting today.
Mr. Kingsley.
12:30 p.m.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I'd like to correct what I said to Madame Picard, in response, and I'll do it in French.
I did not recommend that candidates’ representatives be provided with lists of electors that would include the year of birth. I did not make that recommendation. I only recommended that such lists be given to the people in charge, to election officials. I would like to clarify this.
With regard to radio and television broadcasting, I consulted the political parties before making the recommendation, the first time. The second time, I repeated the recommendation. I simply want to straighten this out, because according to your committee minutes, you were under the impression I had not done so.
However, I did consult the broadcasters and, in my opinion, you should do so.
12:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much for coming again today on short notice; it's appreciated. It was very informative.
Thank you as well to the others, and you're dismissed.
If the members could just stay seated, we'll move straight into other business while our colleagues leave.
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Conservative
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Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear
I'm going to leave that up to the committee. Does the committee wish to go in camera for the discussions?
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Conservative
Jay Hill Conservative Prince George—Peace River, BC
We normally do when we talk about committee business.
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Conservative