Evidence of meeting #15 for Procedure and House Affairs in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was returns.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Yes, they are mentioned in the report; there are 255.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Okay. Maybe I misunderstood that.
One of the questions I have is about what you said:
As of yesterday, we had completed 101 audits.... This compares to 95 such audits completed in the same time span following the 39th general election. Generally, a total of 255 audits have been completed at this time.
That doesn't mean that in previous elections you had 255?
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
No. The 95 compares to the 101.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
So of the 680, there are 255 that have been finalized.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
No. I'm sorry; I realize that it may not have been presented in the best way.
We had 1,600 returns in total. All have to be audited. At this point in time, 255 have been fully audited. Out of the 255, there are 101 candidates who have received a final reimbursement.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
So out of 1,600, there are only 101 people who have gotten their reimbursement?
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Yes, but they're not all entitled to a final reimbursement.
Conservative
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
It's 101 out of 680.
There are 1,600 candidates; 900 are entitled to an initial reimbursement, but only 680 will have a final payment. Out of those 680, 101 have already received their final reimbursement.
This means we have more than 500 still to go, and we're working on them.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
I take a little exception. I think you made a comment to the effect that, generally speaking, most people were satisfied with the process. I'm talking about electors going to the polls. Did you make that comment?
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
That's what the survey shows.
Conservative
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
We do a survey of electors in the week following the election.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
It might be a suggestion to do an exit survey after the person votes, especially at the advance polls, because I can assure you that—certainly in my riding, and I'm not sure about other ridings—the air was blue in some of those advance polls as people were leaving them. As you know, we reported people who left in anger. That's when you need to do your surveys. A week later the tempers have cooled down.
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Yes. That may or may not be good.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
But you're not getting the right information. Most businesses do exit interviews—
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Right after the service is provided?
Conservative
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
Yes, that's certainly one thing we could consider. I don't want to suggest that we should have our initiative rely entirely or solely on surveys. There's other information that needs to be factored in. When you service 14 million electors on a given date, a survey may tell you something, but it doesn't mean there are no pockets here and there of dissatisfaction. We need to look at those.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Do you have an opinion or a thought as to why the participation rate is dropping off? You may not have science on it, but do you have a sort of feel for it, or do your people have a feel for it?
Chief Electoral Officer, Office of the Chief Electoral Officer
We commission a fair bit of research. We are commissioning research for the last election to see why. We all know “what” happened to the turnout, but not the “why”. Time after time, those surveys suggest that maybe 8% of non-voters would attribute the fact that they did not vote to some administrative reasons: they're too busy, they have conflicting schedules--such things as that. Beyond that, there's a wide range of factors that involve engagement in political life. Sometimes there's some cynicism, but that's not.... Basically, it's lack of information. More and more electors are not relying on the mainstream media; they get their information from various alternative sources.
Anyway, it's a challenge, and as part of the evaluation, there will be some discussion about voter turnout phenomena. You can expect further research in the coming year.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Thank you very much for your answers to our questions today. We look forward to the evaluation, and we look forward to further reports so that this committee can also look at those.
We have the duty of asking, shall vote 15 for the Chief Electoral Officer under the Privy Council, less the amount granted in interim supply, carry?
PRIVY COUNCIL
Chief Electoral Officer
Vote 15—Program expenditures..........$27,397,000
(Vote 15 agreed to)
Shall I report the same to the House?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Joe Preston
Thank you very much.
I would say to our guests that they may go, if they like.
Mr. Guimond, do you have one more item?