Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Nov. 13th, 2007

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I propose that we organize a round table composed of the main parties, preferably the ones represented in the House of Commons. I believe 23 or 26 political parties are registered in Canada with the Chief Electoral Officer. I would not want to see a round table with 26 parties represented. Perhaps we could invite the four recognized parties in the House, along with the Green Party. I have nothing against the Natural Law Party or the Christian Democrats, but they could always submit their comments in writing. That is what I would suggest.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

All members heard Monsieur Guimond? That's a good one.

Mr. Godin, please, and then Madam Redman.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Chairman, I would simply like to set some time aside for the witness list. I believe that we have already submitted a few names. I want to be sure that the information is correct.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I would just like to confirm that we did receive your list.

My understanding then is that you are prepared to go, Monsieur Godin, because you've submitted your witness list.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

I just want to verify that we don't have more to add, but I think it should be okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

That's fine. Thank you.

Madam Redmond, please.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I guess we might have another opportunity if provincial chief electoral officers who have experience with Sunday voting specifically might be asked to come and share, either in person or in writing, what their experience was.

Again in the spirit of moving forward, if we want to hear from Monsieur Mayrand and some of the experts, we could roll it out over time rather than waiting.

I would also reiterate my other observation, that I see no reason why we have to put in abeyance the other issue that was before us while we wait for these witnesses to be called and scheduled as they are available.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Madam Redmond, I heard, too, that you might have suggested that we bring witnesses and perhaps study—did you say this?—Bill C-6 and Bill C-16 at the same time because the witnesses are common to the two. No? I misunderstood.

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

No, I was suggesting that there may be provincial chief electoral officers who have experience with Sunday voting, and that it would be useful to hear what their experience was.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Are there any other comments?

I'll try to summarize what I'm hearing. Colleagues are ready to submit witnesses for Bill C-16. Most folks have in fact done their due diligence on witness lists, so we can probably move on that.

I'm also understanding that we don't just do Bill C-16, but that we work in conjunction with other matters before the committee.

Would it be possible to have the witness lists in so that we can have witnesses scheduled for Thursday?

Mr. Reid, please.

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

I have no objection to Thursday. I actually wanted to make a request regarding research from our researchers. I can wait until you have finished coming up with a deadline.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Okay. I just want to get a bit of a note from my support team here. Is it possible to get the witnesses in for Thursday and research done for Thursday?

What I'm hearing is that it depends on the witnesses' availability, which is always the truth, but I imagine we'll have a number of witnesses on the list who we can probably get here by Thursday, if we can have the witness list by.... What if I said three o'clock today for witness lists for Bill C-16?

[Karen Redman, Liberal, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Could that be with the understanding that it would be a preliminary list?

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Of course.

Members should know that in the past we've been very lenient with regard to witness lists. We've often received names of witnesses after the deadline. It's not been my policy to say no to that. It's not been my policy, actually, to say no to any witness. We do kind of take into consideration the costs, and we might do some video conferencing, but members should know that the chair has been fairly easygoing with witnesses. So if you should happen to remember somebody at five o'clock, I don't see a problem with that. I'm just trying to set a time: three o'clock.

I did see a hand down here.

Yes, please, Mr. Angus and then Mr. Godin.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I appreciate your saying that you're looking to be reasonable about witnesses. We have witnesses we'll be bringing forward.

I think it is something for all of us to remember, because the issue is sensitive for a lot of people. Most people in Canada probably aren't even aware we're discussing this. There will be people from various organizations coming who might take exception even to the discussion and who probably would want to participate in it. I think we have to be sensitive to that and be willing to be a little flexible if some people do want to bring forward a presentation on the issue of voting on a Sunday.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you, Mr. Angus.

Monsieur Guimond.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

The Bloc Québécois would have one more name to add to the list. Therefore, we won't have everything wrapped up by 3 p.m. this afternoon. I propose Marcel Blanchet, Quebec's Chief Electoral Officer.

As for the suggestion of our colleague Karen Redman that we invite chief electoral officers who have already experimented with Sunday voting, since Quebec has tried it, I agree with my colleague's proposal. I would add to the list the former Chief Electoral Officer for Quebec, Mr. Pierre F. Côté, a prominent expert in this field in Canada. He has testified before the committee in the past and his expertise is very relevant.

That completes the Bloc Québécois' list of witnesses on Bill C-16.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Are there any other comments on Bill C-16?

I'm hearing that we will submit our witness lists by three o'clock today. The clerk will make every attempt to set up witnesses for Thursday's meeting. You will be informed of who is going to be here. I suspect that with the number of witnesses coming forward we'll have a full meeting. So that's the nature of the meeting for Thursday.

Mr. Reid, did you have a comment?

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

I was going to ask whether we could get our researchers to take a look at the questions that I think are germane here.

Obviously this bill is attempting to expand voting locations and the number of days on which voting can take place. I suppose the location considerations are not novel in that voting is anticipated to take place at the existing advance poll locations, and then on the final advance poll day they will take place at all locations where polls are typically held.

I'm thinking of other jurisdictions and would like to mention some that I think we should be looking at. A number of countries in Europe have adopted the practice of having their votes on weekend days, or more specifically on Sundays. Their experience would be germane, particularly if we can find jurisdictions that have had a vote on a Sunday versus a week day, such as the Mondays we typically have in Canada. I don't know all the countries that would be relevant in this case, but I know a number of European countries do this. I'm told that it's one of the reasons European voter turnouts tend to be higher than those in the United States, for example, where they're notoriously low.

We could certainly get very quick information, which might turn out to be relevant, from our friends at the Australian Electoral Commission. We relied on them in a previous incarnation of this committee, when a group of MPs from this committee went to Australia during the last Parliament. We met with some officials by teleconference here, as well. The Australian Electoral Commission not only does the federal elections in Australia, but also administers--

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

I'm sorry, Mr. Reid, can I interrupt?

Colleagues, I should let you know that the cameras are probably on, or they will be within 30 seconds.

Mr. Reid, please continue.

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

I'll turn mine off in a second, Mr. Chairman. I'm lucky that wasn't mine. I'm just as guilty.

Yes, I was saying that the Australian Electoral Commission administers not merely federal elections in Australia but also state and territorial elections. Therefore, you'd have about eight or nine jurisdictions to look at. New Zealand, as well, has cooperated with us. I think we have pretty good connections through our research branch with a number of European electoral commissions. A separate groups of MPs from this committee went to Scotland and also to Germany as a part of that process. It was electoral reform that we were looking at, and we were talking to chief electoral officers. I think we can revive those contacts and hopefully get some germane information.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Thank you, Mr. Reid.

Is there any further comment on preparation for the study of Bill C-16?

My understanding is that we will have witness lists in by three o'clock today. Our clerk will set up witnesses for Thursday. As well, we will have research available to members that I understand will be sent out tomorrow.

The other thing is that TV is ready, so I guess we'll just start the TV up at any time? All right, we're ready to go. Members, we are on TV in a public meeting.

The other thing I would like members to comment about, given that we're studying Bill C-16 on Thursday, is whether we still want this room. Do we still want that televised? My understanding from Madam Redman is that there is some value to televising committee meetings, but I want some indication from the committee itself on whether we'll be in this room and therefore televised. Are there any objections? Perhaps you can comment to me by the end of this meeting on whether or not we should be televised in this room on Thursday. I'm going to take the position that we will be in this room on Thursday, televised, unless I hear differently from the majority of the committee.

Moving forward, I want to remind colleagues that at the end of the last meeting we were on the subamendment to the main motion. Mr. Epp had the floor and the committee agreed to give Mr. Epp the floor today.

The other members I have on the debate list are Mr. Epp, Madam Redman, and Mr. Reid, and I'll still watch for names to be put up. We are ready to move forward.

Do members have copies of the main motion and the subamendment to the main motion in front of them? Okay, I think we're good on that.

Mr. Epp, please, you have the floor.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I think maybe just to refocus here we should look again at where we're at in this debate. If I'm not mistaken, I believe we have a motion by Ms. Redman that says:

That the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs investigate the actions of the Conservative Party of Canada during the 2006 election, in relation to which Elections Canada has refused to reimburse Conservative candidates for illegitimate election campaign expenses.

Now, there were a number of amendments made. The word “illegitimate” was rightfully challenged. We also had the question as to whether or not it should refer to only the 2006 election or if it should go back to 2004. Also we debated, as we will all recall, whether or not it should be the Conservative Party only or also the Liberal Party.

As a result we had a motion to amend by Mr. Reid, which I would like to remind us of, and that is:

That the motion be amended by deleting the word “illegitimate”; and by replacing all the words after the word “expenses” with the following: “that are alleged not to be in conformity with the expenses limits under the Canada Elections Act”.

That motion was debated for a while and then later on, by unanimous consent, was withdrawn. So then we were back to the original motion.

Then my colleague Mr. Lemieux, for whom I am sitting in today, moved an amendment. His amendment, and that's the one we're on right now, was:

That the motion be amended by replacing the words “2006 election” with the following: “2004 and 2006 federal elections”; and by replacing all the words after the word “relation” with the following: “and in comparison to the election campaign expenses of the Liberal Party of Canada, and where Elections Canada has refused to reimburse some Conservative candidates for election campaign expenses”.

Now, I don't know whether people suffer from the same symptoms as I do after a week of exciting activity in the riding, but not all of the debate is fresh in my mind. Of course I'm older than most members here so I have the senior's moment to call upon as well. But we were debating this, and I recall that I appealed very directly to this committee to make sure the work of this committee is not tainted by a partisan thrust, which would, I believe, bring some discredit to this committee.

I appeal to the majority, who happens to be in opposition here, to think very carefully about the amendment my colleague moved because of the fact that it substantially removes from the original motion a very obvious political bias. Now, I'm not saying that we're not political as members of Parliament. We all are. We have points of view. We differ sometimes rather strenuously on how the government should conduct the affairs of the country, and indeed we differ on some pretty basic issues right along a wide spectrum. But I think this committee--as its name says explicitly, it's a procedure and House affairs committee--has to do with how Parliament runs.

In this particular case, the committee is given the responsibility of overseeing the Elections Act and the work of the Chief Electoral Officer. I can only appeal as strenuously as possible to my fellow members on this committee that we need to make sure that, as Elections Canada is to be non-partisan and treat all parties and all candidates equally under the rules, so this committee, which oversees Elections Canada, should very, very explicitly be non-partisan. To attack one party to the exclusion of others is not non-partisan, no matter how you slice it.

What this committee should be doing is looking at the broad principles being applied, and in this particular case the issue at hand is whether or not Elections Canada has properly administered the law. That is, in the broad stroke, the issue that's before the House.

So the amendment my colleague moved was to look beyond the last election to the 2004 election, which gives a little broader perspective to the implications and the administration of the rules, and also to include the other major party in the election. It has always been between the Liberals and the Conservatives primarily. We don't want to minimize the NDP and the Bloc, who of course are properly elected by their constituents and come to the House of Commons.

[The Chair, Conservative, Gary Goodyear]

Excuse me, please.

Mr. Angus, on a point of order.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I was not sure if I understood my colleague correctly when he said the main issue is between the Liberals and the Conservatives. Is he talking about electoral problems and misspending or is he talking about elections in general? Could he clarify for me?