Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Dec. 7th, 2006

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

To look at the system that we have now is perhaps the best answer I can provide. That is to say, many homeless people have a health card at least, some piece of ID. They have a health card. They don't have a driver's licence, but they have a health card because they need health services. And a good number of them have that.

On top of that, the system that we have now relies on obtaining either proof of residence from the people who run the shelters where they stayed the night before the election or documents from the soup kitchens where they obtained a meal, as to where they were. And that is what we use to establish residence, which is a very open--

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

What kind of a document would suffice?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

There is a document that we have prepared called a “statement of residence”, which the people who run the shelters can fill out. It's all preset. So we do that already.

We ask returning officers to identify where these shelters are in their ridings and to visit them beforehand, and also to put up posters so that people.... There's a public notice that we put up in shelters where people reside or where they obtain soup services, whatever, and it tells them that this is going on...to get to know who the person is. So we make targeted efforts here to reach out to these people. Because of their transient nature--they're homeless--we ask for those documents very close to the event, so that we know they're there.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Would it be fair to say then, sir, that in your opinion--and I don't want to put words in your mouth--you're doing as much as you think can possibly be done to ensure that these individuals have the ability to vote, or are there more things you think could be done to give an even higher degree of probability to their casting their ballots?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

I think we have done, through our efforts, what we could at the time.

I know that there's a report that was published recently in Quebec on homelessness, and I've asked my people to obtain it. It was reported on the day before. It deals with homelessness in Canada in general. I want to make sure that we're up to date on where there is a phenomenon, more precisely, and see if there's anything else we can be doing under the present law, which I think has allowed and does allow homeless people to vote.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

We are done that round. We will have time to come back.

Now I will go to Mr. Dewar for three minutes.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Related to that note, in terms of what's proposed in the bill, we have a proposition that only one person be able to vouch for a person who isn't on the list and allow them to be registered. Presently, do you have any data or any sense of whether this is a phenomenon whereby we have one person vouching for many different people?

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

We've looked at that, and there isn't much of it occurring.

I'm trying to remember the riding in which we looked at this. Was it Trinity--Spadina?

[Rennie Molnar]

No, it was actually in the by-elections.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

Perhaps Mr. Molnar could add to this.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Absolutely, of course.

Mr. Molnar.

[Rennie Molnar]

One of the things we should make clear is that under the current statute you can only vouch for one person. I just want to make that clear, because I know we've seen some testimony that kind of raises that question.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Okay.

[Rennie Molnar]

We ran two by-elections recently in Repentigny and London North Centre. We wanted to track how often vouching occurred. In London North Centre about 2,800 people actually registered on polling day. The numbers we got back showed that a little over 100 people were vouched for across the riding, and there were basically one or two at each poll. One poll had about 11, but that was a seniors residence. It is really not something we see occur very often, at least based on that analysis.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

In this bill there's obviously a proposition to change what is presently the case. Just for my own clarification, the change is that the person who is vouching has to be a registered voter on the list--as opposed to more than one person.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

They must have pieces of ID as well. There are two changes.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Okay.

In the first round we were talking about a barrier--you might call it something else—in being able to vouch for someone, compared to the present system. You're requiring further verification of who the person is doing the vouching.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

There are more stringent requirements proposed on the voucher.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Okay.

We heard testimony in the last committee hearings that people in shelters, and in some cases with language barriers, etc., do require help and sometimes require help to get on the list. I would be very concerned about the response from Elections Canada in helping those people, that if all of a sudden we have new criteria and requirements that are more stringent than what we have presently, we would have that thought out.

I personally believe that having a statutory declaration and allowing the present system to exist, if indeed there is no problem that we've identified in terms of the vouching, we should allow it to remain the way it is, particularly if we can strengthen the enumeration process.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you.

We're over time, so I appreciate that, Mr. Dewar.

I have three names left on my list. We're sort of entering the next round. It's perfectly okay if there are no more questions, but I will then allow those who are still on my list to address our witnesses.

Mr. Hill, please.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Kingsley, as it should be, a big part of your presentation dealt with this whole idea of what identification should be acceptable, or how difficult you foresee it to be for someone to have acceptable identification at the polls if they're not on the list. I'm just wondering whether there's ever been any cost analysis done on going to a system like they have in South Africa, where every voter has a picture ID card.

Obviously other countries do it; I don't know how many, other than South Africa. I had the privilege of being in South Africa last summer and met with their electoral commission. We went through the whole process they use. I think this has been raised before. They use a voter ID card. The voter must have that specific photo card, plus they ink the person's thumb.

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

There are a number of countries that have very elaborate systems. I think I mentioned Mexico before. They have a 12-character alphanumeric card with a photo, thumb print, signature--everything is on the card, but it's the only document they have for 50% of the population. Brazil also has something that is very thorough.

We have never done a cost-benefit analysis because it has never been contemplated. If the committee wishes, I will undertake such a study to see how much it would cost. Remember, it's costing us about $6 million now just through databanks to do the updates from older vehicles, from the revenue files, and so on, which is very cheap for what we're achieving. But I think the cost would go up very significantly, to be honest with you, because I know how much it costs in Mexico to do this and maintain it. But it's entirely feasible.

[Jay Hill, Conservative, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

I would think there should be some way to do it utilizing existing infrastructure, in the sense of making a deal with the provinces. People go to the motor vehicle branch, for example, to get a driver's licence. They have the equipment right there, where you stand there and it takes your picture and prints.

There has to be some way to do it relatively inexpensively. I know that it would be obviously more costly than not having any card, but it would be one way to further address this issue of what is or isn't acceptable. If you had to have a card, and the onus or responsibility was on the individual citizen to go to get their card, then....

[Jean-Pierre Kingsley]

If we were able to maintain the present update mechanisms to provide cards to people, then it would be much less expensive than what the other countries are doing—I agree with that. Then it would be a matter of making sure that citizens are aware that the card is theirs to maintain up to date. Certainly we would be able to do it at much less expense.

That is a scenario we could develop further, if this committee at some stage would wish to have that done.