I would like to move NDP-33.
The amendment would delete proposed subsection 143(3.3) in Bill C-23. The proposed subsection in the bill reads as follows:
A candidate or their representative may examine but not handle any piece of identification presented under this section.
Now, “a candidate or their representative” is effectively shorthand for scrutineers. It's very rare you'll have a candidate bouncing around at every polling station, so it's a representative. What this authorizes is that those who are not actually the desk officers but the people making sure that the process, for your party's sake, for your candidate's sake, is working well can simply say, “Can I see that piece of ID?” They can examine it but not handle it.
I'm not going to say it's a matter of handling; it's just that somebody has to hold it up to them and they can see it. The Chief Electoral Officer brought our attention to this. It was part of his amendments. He suggested that this be deleted, so this is what this amendment does. It would delete those lines, and therefore this new provision wouldn't exist.
I won't give you the number of reasons, just in case I forget what number I gave, but one reason this is a problem is privacy. For average voters there are pieces of ID on the lists, and on maybe expanded lists, that might have information that a person is content that a person at the table could look at but not a random person.
The second thing is it has the potential, and this was actually the Chief Electoral Officer's point, to produce the perception, or the feeling, on the part of the voter of harassment. It doesn't actually have to be harassment for that to occur and for that to produce some kind of a disincentive to voting the next time, or just an unpleasant experience during voting, which has to be avoided at all costs.
The third thing is that it could actually be harassment or intimidation. Let's just say that's unlikely, by and large; I don't assume that average scrutineers will act any more dishonourably than the average voter. We don't believe the average voter is inclined to commit fraud. I don't believe the average scrutineer would intentionally harass or intimidate, but that would be perhaps the result and the feeling.
There's a last thing that's tied to these: lineups. Really, the idea that you have an enthusiastic scrutineer, who does not have to have any bad faith, or simply a scrutineer under instructions to carefully check ID.... It produces lineups. It produces frustration. It could even produce, among people at the end of the line, their deciding not to wait anymore.
Canadians, by the way, however much we are maybe one people who will line up better than others, are not exactly patient when it comes to this kind of thing. People are used to fairly quick voting in this country. This could contribute to a very different experience. There are reports south of the border of the use of asking for ID as a way to create lineups. I would hope we wouldn't get into that kind of scenario, but it's possible.
I would end by saying, Mr. Chair, that I move to delete this new examination of identification documents provision, and leave it in your capable hands.