Thank you.
Five minutes? Fine, I'll be very quick. I'll make two comments and then I'll have a question.
On the 100-metre rule, I think it would be unfair if I were living near a polling station and wanted to put up a sign and somebody denied me the right to exercise my democratic right to show my support to whichever party I wanted to show it to. So I agree that people are in agreement with that--except one party.
My second question is on the registration by Internet. I was wondering whether anybody has any concerns about fraud or what sort of checks and balances can be put in place to have registration of electors by the Internet.
The third thing I want to ask about is vouching. Electors should be able to vouch for more than one member of the family. I think I heard some concerns about vouching. I asked Elections Canada how many people used this system the last time, but they couldn't answer me. I know that we are all afraid of fraud or whatever. We want to maintain the credibility of the system.
My main question, though, goes to the contributions to the leadership contestant. I understand where some of the people are coming from. If I make a comparison of the democracy of Canada versus that of the U.S., and I see that in one day a presidential candidate can drop $2 million, are we trying to say that we should attract people for their brains or for their money? What are we trying to do?
Not everybody has the financial capacity, so are you going to say that you would disallow those types of people from participation in a democracy process? I don't have the capacity to raise that much money, but should I not be given the chance to run if I so wish? Why are we so stuck that this money will go to the national party, etc.?
I'd like your input--from Mr. Arnold first, and then I could likely go around the table--as to how we could improve the system. It has been done in the past. We want to improve the system. How do we go about improving the system and increasing democratic participation?
Thank you.