Evidence of meeting #25 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 limit.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Marlene Jennings Liberal Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, QC
We're taking the lead from the Prime Minister--the 2008 election.
Conservative
Conservative
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, ON
They could take the lead on a regular basis. Perhaps if they condemned the practice so much, they could stop putting...[Inaudible--Editor]...over and over again.
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
Thank you, Mr. Neufeld, for being here. I enjoyed your presentation.
Let me see if I can get this clear. In British Columbia, do you have referendum committees?
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
The way the regime worked before the 2009 referendum, we had committees for that one, umbrella committees, proponent and opponent groups that were given the public funding, but in addition to that—and this is all there was in previous referendums—you could register as a referendum advertiser. It was like being a third party advertiser in an election.
The rules in 2009 were very clear, though. If you were a referendum advertiser, you couldn't promote a political party or a candidate. If you were a political party, you could state your position on the referendum, but you had to consider that advertising as an election expense and you had to stay within the expense limits. You could become a registered referendum advertiser and a registered election advertiser, but you had to keep your messages separate then. There were no limits on spending and no limits on contributions to third parties.
November 17th, 2009 / 12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
Sorry, except during an election. For the referendum, there are no limits. For the election, there was a limit. There was a limit that was struck down pre-writ, actually, for third party advertisers. The limit during an election is $150,000, and $3,000 in any one electoral district.
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
Okay. I'm just trying to get the contrast between what you do in British Columbia and the situation we have federally.
Were you listening to the presentation before?
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
Currently we have a system where, for contributions to federally registered political parties, the maximum is $1,100 per individual. Unions and corporations cannot contribute at all. However, if there is a referendum, whether it be referendum committees or third parties, they can receive and spend, outside of Quebec, unlimited amounts of money, it seems.
If there is a convergence of views between a particular third party and a political party, one could very easily make the case that you're doing an end run on the political financing regime because you're giving $100,000 to a third party who's advocating a position identical to that of a political party. So rather than be restricted to $1,100 to contribute to your favourite political party, you can contribute 10 or 20 or 100 times more than that to a third party who will be advocating the same position.
I'm wondering how you deal with that. Is it similar in British Colombia, or do you have regulations in place to prevent that type of end run from occurring?
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
The only regulation that I think really addresses that is a law that prevents a registered referendum advertiser from promoting or opposing, directly or indirectly—that's the wording you'll often hear with election advertising—the election of a candidate or a party. They can make only statements that promote a particular response to the referendum ballot in their advertising.
So it's unlimited expenses for referendum advertisers. But first of all, there weren't that many referendum advertisers who registered. Secondly, from what I've seen, they didn't spend nearly as much money as was the case in 2005. Most of the money went in support of these two umbrella groups, which were each receiving half a million dollars from the government to promote the debate.
Conservative
Tom Lukiwski Conservative Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK
Do you care to offer an opinion, then—and it'll be my final question, Chair—on whether, if it's a simultaneous referendum with a provincial election, there should be committees at all? Should third party advocacy groups be allowed to spend money and receive money, or should it just be through the political process?
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
It's a very interesting question. In both of the two referenda I have administered, the politicians and political parties have stayed curiously quiet and have not engaged in the debate. When I think about the kinds of topics that might be the subject of a federal referendum, I can't imagine that being the case.
My sense is that you need a debate for the referendum to be meaningful. The question of whether that debate will be addressed politically is the one you have to deal with. The democrat in me says you should foster that debate, and if having citizens' committees does that, by all means have them. The pragmatist in me says if you're going to have to register all these committees, manage their spending limits, and oversee them, you might be looking at an administrative headache.
I guess I'm riding the fence here, but I appreciate the gravity of the questions this committee has to grapple with.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Neufeld, as I arrived late, I missed the beginning of your presentation, and so you have perhaps already answered the question I am going to ask.
As far as I understand it, there is no referendum committee in British Columbia, be it an umbrella committee, a committee for the “yes” camp or a committee for the “no” camp.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
In the referendum this year in May there was an umbrella proponent group for electoral reform, BC-STV, and there was an opponent group. They were both funded, and this was a first in British Columbia referenda. There was also the ability for other groups to form as registered referendum advertisers, but there wasn't a lot of that.
Most of the community that was interested in this gravitated to the proponent and opponent groups and funded them and assisted their efforts in getting the message out on the two sides of the referendum debate.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
If I understand you correctly, you are referring to the most recent referendum, which was held at the same time as the elections in May 2009. Is that correct?
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
In the one that was held this year, it was the first time we had these two umbrella groups, and the first time there was any public funding for referendum groups. Before that, the regimes were always along the lines of third party advertisers for an election. There was a requirement for referendum advertisers to register and disclose their funding after the referendum was over.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
But was this referendum held at the same time as the provincial election?
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
I am curious as to how you keep expenditure for the referendum separate from expenditure for the election. I would imagine that in British Columbia, as in the federal context, you set a maximum amount that each political party can spend and a maximum amount that each candidate for each riding can spend. But what do you do when a referendum is held at the same time as the election? Do you keep separate accounts? In normal circumstances, it is fairly straightforward.
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
There is separate accounting for the referendum and the election, except for political parties. Political parties were able to incorporate referendum advertising into their election advertising, but they still had to stay within their expense limits. This is relatively new legislation. For parties it was 60 days before the writs were issued--before the campaign period started. It was $1.1 million, and during the four-week campaign period it was $4.4 million.
Candidates could not advertise their position on the referendum with the election. They had to stay separate from it. They could register as a referendum advertiser, they could speak about it, they could write editorials about it, but they were prevented from doing advertising. Their limit was $70,000 in the 60 days before the election started and $70,000 for the 28-day period itself.
Bloc
Michel Guimond Bloc Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC
I am struggling to follow you. Let us take a concrete example. Premier Campbell's party, the Liberal Party, is allowed to spend $5 million on being re-elected. His party is part of the group of political parties in favour of electoral reform. The group is allowed to spend $3 million. So the party can spend $5 million, and, in addition, provide funding to the pro-reform group, provided that the $3 million limit is not exceeded. Is that correct?
Chief Electoral Officer, Elections BC
I see where you're going. It's not what happened in British Columbia, though.
As far as I know, neither of the political parties that are in the House made any contributions to either the proponent or the opponent groups. We'll see when we get the full disclosures, which will come out next March, when there's a public disclosure for the whole process from the political parties about where their money went over the last year.
I think it is a little bit interesting that the political attitude was very much that this is a decision for the people to make, that this is a decision the politicians need to step back from, in terms of changing electoral systems, and there was no advocacy on the part of either the governing party or the opposition party to advocate for the change or against it. Individual members made comments, some of them for and some of them against, but for the most part, the position was that this is a decision you need to make yourself. I think, for that reason, there wasn't nearly the level of debate in our society as there might have been; and it's why, I'm sure, so few people seemed to know about the referendum, relative to the election, just a few weeks before general voting day.
