Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Dec. 12th, 2006

Evidence of meeting #35 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 amendment.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Public Service Employment Act

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Marc Chénier Counsel, Legislation and House Planning, Privy Council Office

Natasha Kim Senior Policy Advisor, Legislation and House Planning, Privy Council Office

Dan McDougall Director of Operations, Legislation and House Planning, Privy Council Office

Raymond MacCallum Counsel, Human Rights Law Section, Department of Justice

Joann Garbig Procedural Clerk

Clerk of the Committee

4:50 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Gary Goodyear

Colleagues, we are now on to clause 42. There is a government amendment to clause 42. It is amendment G-8, and it's on page 40 of your package.

I would ask Mr. Reid to please move the amendment and speak to it. Thank you.

4:50 p.m.

Conservative

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

I move the amendment.

The purpose of this amendment is to allow the coming into force of the bill to happen as soon as is realistically possible. As worded in the initial draft of the bill, it says that the act “comes into force six months after the day on which it is assented to”. If you look at that language, you'll see that there is a provision in the Elections Act that says basically all amendments to the Elections Act come into force within six months unless the Chief Electoral Officer publishes a notice in the Canada Gazette to indicate that necessary preparations have taken place.

When the Chief Electoral Officer was here as a witness, he indicated that the six-month deadline would be difficult to achieve with regard to the voters list provisions, but for other provisions of the bill it would be no challenge to achieve these changes. I think we can understand how some of the provisions really take no preliminary effort on his part at all and are simply areas to carry through on.

I specifically asked him at that time about the identity considerations. I raised the issue of the length of time required before an election takes place, and I inquired about whether there would be any problems with his coming back with a list. He indicated to us at that time that he could come back to meet with this committee and go through the process he proposes: his list of suggested identification and then getting our approval immediately upon the coming into force of the act.

All of this allows for all the parts of the act, other than those that relate to the electors list, to occur more quickly. That's effectively what happens under the proposed amendment to clause 42.