Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Feb. 7th, 2013

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

The folks in Red Deer have always had their own riding, so this is new for them as well. I can't speak for them; however, my indications from the media in the City of Red Deer are that they would prefer to maintain a riding in which the entire city would be within the boundaries of one riding.

I reject the premise of the boundary commission that those are the only two options. As I said earlier to Mr. Cullen, it all depends on where you start drawing lines. The current riding of Wetaskiwin has exactly the right number of people, give or take 2% or 3%, and you can start drawing your lines from there. It becomes an exercise in where you start drawing the lines.

I think the proposal I brought forward today, while it certainly accommodates some of the communities in the western part of the County of Ponoka and the western part of the County of Lacombe and brings them back into a central Alberta riding, is better than the doughnut option.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Madame Turmel is next.

[Nycole Turmel, NDP, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

There is one thing I find interesting.

You mentioned that you chose not to make any representations to the commission and that you preferred to come meet with us.

You know what powers this committee has. We can make recommendations, but they may not listen to everything we have to say.

I'm trying to understand. If I've understood correctly, 19 groups made representations against the commission's recommendation. Don't you think that, by adding your voice and with the support of your fellow citizens, that you might have been able to convince the commission to make a change?

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

I don't understand the point of the question, Madame Turmel.

The reality is this is my domain as a member of Parliament on behalf of the folks I represent. Knowing all along that the process would allow me this opportunity, I in good faith did want to maintain my distance from the boundary process. I maintained in good faith that the commission would listen to the residents who were affected and would act accordingly. It would have been my wish, Ms. Turmel, to not have even come here today. My wish would have been that the boundary commission would have taken the advice of my constituents and the stakeholders who made those testimonies, and I could have removed myself from the process altogether, in a truly transparent process.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Go ahead, Mr. Lukiwski, to hopefully finish this off.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

I have a comment to add to what Madame Turmel was saying.

Blaine, I made a submission in Saskatchewan. I originally thought I might not, because I thought it would be better if the constituents themselves did so. Nonetheless, I did, and I can assure Madame Turmel that my voice didn't change the commission's viewpoint one iota.

I'm not trying to be unfair here, but I believe that many commissions have an almost predisposed view of what a map should look like after they do their preliminary work, and many of them, I believe, go in thinking that's the best map possible. While they take advice and sometimes act upon it, many times they do not, so I am just saying, Blaine, that I don't know if you would have had any impact anyway, had you appeared.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Perhaps I'm out of line for suggesting this to the committee, but this is the first time I have experienced this process. This is basically changing the colour of the car. That's all we're talking about.

If we're going to do this, I think a useful exercise might be to have commissions do consultations before the first set of boundaries are even drawn. In that way, advice could be taken.

I think it's a very difficult thing for a commission to draw a set of maps, put them out there, receive criticism, and go into a full retreat mode. Nobody wants to be put in that situation. I think in future iterations of this review process, as legislators we might want to look at perhaps getting input from the constituencies and stakeholders first, before the first set of maps comes out, and then have hearings to see if it worked according to people's wishes and go from there.

Maybe it's naive of me to think that's a better process, but as I say, at this point all I'm trying to do is capture some of the wishes the constituents have expressed to me about this, and put it into a map that makes better sense for those who live in the areas between Red Deer and Edmonton.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you, Mr. Calkins, for coming today and for sharing with us your thoughts and the changes you would like to see. You mentioned more than once that you're a realist and that you recognize your ultimate wish may not be possible, but you've done a good job of representing your constituents on some of the movements of boundaries for smaller issues and certainly on name change.

Thank you for your information. If you have any other information that you would like to leave with us or share with us that we could use for our report, it would be great. If any of the members have any other information they would like from Mr. Calkins, now is the time to ask for it.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Wetaskiwin, AB]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you, members of the committee, for taking the time to hear me.

[The Chair, Conservative, Joe Preston]

Thank you.

We will suspend for a moment or two while Mr. Calkins leaves.