My name is David Harris. I'm senior fellow for national security.
On behalf of the Canadian Coalition for Democracies, I would like to thank you for this opportunity to address the committee.
People have covered a good many subjects in this important area. I'm going to confine myself to one very important one that I think is derivative of the rest.
A number of blithe statements have been made about how it might not be appropriate for people fully veiled to appear in polling stations, and so on. That is essentially the position of the Canadian Coalition for Democracies. However, these statements also go on to assume that it is appropriate in some way for females only to be qualified, as government officials, to screen those women wearing veils.
This would, in our view, enlist the government's machinery and its personnel in legitimizing, advancing, and enforcing a sharia-type gender apartheid sensibility and standard. It would be an assault on principles of gender equality, according to our Constitution. It would ban male electoral officials solely on the basis of their gender from performing lawful functions of voter identification, and the implications would proceed from there. Government, its machinery, and people would be required to, in some form, shape themselves to gender apartheid sharia standards.
Thank you.